CHAPTER 1 



THE TREE MASTERPIECE 

 OF THE PLANT WORLD 



Trees and rocks will teach what thou canst not hear from a master. 



ST. BERNARD. 



EVERYTHING in this world every material thing has been 

 placed by science into one of two great classes or kingdoms. 

 These are the kingdoms of the living and of the lifeless the 

 animate and the inanimate. Into the first class science system- 

 atically gathers together all the earth's dwellers that contain 

 the mysterious spark called life. All plants, insects, birds, the 

 smallest germ, the tiniest seed man himself. These, we say, 

 belong to the kingdom of the living. In the other class falls 

 everything that is without life, the rocks, the waters of the 

 earth, the metals in the earth, the atmosphere that surrounds it. 



The kingdom of living things has been still further divided 

 into animal life and plant life. It is a convenient division and 

 apparently definite and clear cut, but as a matter of fact, no 

 one has yet been able to say just where one division ends and 

 the others begins. The boundaries shift back and forth and 

 grow indistinct. For, so far as science has been able to learn all 

 living substance is basically the same and among the exceed- 

 ingly minute forms of life it is not always possible to tell 

 animal from plant. The microscope has revealed living things 

 so perplexing in form and structure that no one can say whether 



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