Winner of the 

 JOHN BURROUGHS AWARD 



"This book will serve as a guide to thrilling 

 adventures in the world of growing plants. The 

 author has accumulated a wealth of information 

 and his book is crammed full with hundreds of 

 interesting facts about plant life. He is blessed 

 with the ability of expressing himself simply 

 and accurately, and this, together with his in- 

 tense interest in plants and his delightful style, 

 has been used to excellent advantage in produc- 

 ing a book which is entertaining and educa- 

 tional as well." The New York Times. 



THIS GREEN 

 WORLD 



By RUTHERFORD PLATT 



THIS book is the lively and reveal- 

 ing chronicle of a naturalist who 

 has gone out with cameras and a 

 huge curiosity to discover the thrill 

 and action or nature's world, as well 

 as the beauty of its scenery. It deals 

 by text and pictures with the miracle 

 of the tree which to most of us has 

 thus far been a commonplace with 

 the beauty of little-known tree buds, 

 and with the flowers of the field 

 their colors, their ways of living, 

 their families and propagation. 



Trees are turned inside out, and 

 we discover a vast water-works sys- 

 tem, lifting tons of water. The au- 

 thor explores deep into the earth and 

 finds root systems, hundreds of miles 

 long. He directs a magic telescope 

 toward the sun and sees how color 

 and light are transported to earth 

 and transformed into trees and 

 flowers. He explains the miracle of 

 chlorophyll. He looks through the 

 trunk of the tree and finds not solid 

 wood, but an intricate system for 

 transporting water and food. 



He proves that trees and flowers 

 in the world around us are not fix- 

 tures of the landscape but active units 

 in a great moving drama. Wild 

 flowers appear and disappear accord- 

 ing to schedules based on the number 

 of minutes in a day. 



THIS GREEN WORLD is magnificently 

 illustrated with a remarkable series 

 of one hundred and thirty-five photo- 

 graphs by the author twenty-seven 

 of them in full color in addition to 

 one hundred and ten drawings. 



