EPILOGUE. 173 



of excellence up toward the mountain's crest, where beauty 

 dwells and toys with grace. Evolution sits sceptered in the 

 throne room of a carnation's life, it is ambushed with its embryo 

 in its seedbed of mealy albumen. Evolution hears the chimes of 

 loftier life, counts the units of heat, and light that fate affords, 

 then mounts to the summit of their annual average. A law of 

 the universe is epitomized in this plant. The carnation is embodied 

 evolution. It enacts the law in pantomime and sing its song 

 without an accent. 



A grain of corn hides in its germ food for millions. There 

 are unborn forests in an acorn's cup, and a world of wonders cor- 

 ralled in a carnation's carpel. 



There is not an instance in the world's botany in which a 

 single variety of a genus of plants so completely absorbs the mer- 

 its of an Order, and all its cognate species, as does the carnation. 

 There are but three species of the Dianthus genus of plants, be- 

 sides Caryophyllus, that bear a flower worthy of a glance. D. 

 Barbatus, D. Plumaris, D. Chinesus, and their countless sports. 

 The cognate relations of carnation are known as ragweed, star- 

 wort, catchfly lychnis, ragged robin, stickey weed, sand wort, 

 mouse-eared pink, and scores of others too insignificant to sport 

 even a vulgar name, which the grace and beauty of Dianthus 

 Superba would entrance a seraph, if it was not gazing on a God. 



There never was a Satrap with as many poor relations, or a 

 Midas with such a multitude of impoverished peons. It is 

 sovereign over the realm of flowers and rules a world of weeds. 



There is a dynamic energy that centralizes sentiment and 

 polarizes power. Every thing on earth tends to Alpine heights, or 

 to tartarean depths, to mirific force, or ravishing beauty. The 

 most chaotic contentions of life at last focalize themselves in a 

 single brain, condense their issues into edicts and leap in epi- 

 grams from fire-touched tongues. 



"Liberty or Death" is all there was between Lexington and 

 Yorktown. "Union and Liberty," between Sumpter and Appo- 

 mattox. 



