THE SUCCESSION OF FOREST TREES. 51 



was cultivating a few plants for his own use. I have 

 no doubt that some or all of these plants sprang from 

 seeds which had long been buried under or about that 

 house, and that that tobacco is an additional evidence 

 that the plant was formerly cultivated here. The 

 cellar has been filled up this year, and four of those 

 plants, including the tobacco, are now again extinct 

 in that locality. 



It is true, I have shown that the animals consume 

 a great part of the seeds of trees, and so, at least, 

 effectually prevent their becoming trees ; but in all 

 these cases, as I have said, the consumer is compelled 

 to be at the same time the disperser and planter, and 

 this is the tax which he pays to nature. I think it is 

 Linnaeus who says, that while the swine is rooting 

 for acorns, he is planting acorns. 



Though I do not believe that a plant will spring up 

 where no seed has been, I have great faith in a seed 

 a, to me, equally mysterious origin for it. Con 

 vince me that you have a seed there, and I am pre 

 pared to expect wonders. I shall even believe that 

 the millennium is at hand, and that the reign of jus 

 tice is about to commence, when the Patent Office, or 

 Government, begins to distribute, and the people to 

 plant the seeds of these things. 



In the spring of 1857 I planted six seeds sent to 

 me from the Patent Office, and labelled, I think, 

 &quot; Poitrine jaune grosse&quot; l large yellow squash. Two 

 came up, and one bore a squash which weighed 

 pounds, the other bore four, weighing together 

 pounds. Who would have believed that there was 

 310 pounds of poitrine jaune grosse in that corner of 

 my garden? These seeds were the bait I used to 

 1 Pronounced pwah-treen zhone yroce. 



