DEVELOPMENT AND STRUCTURE. 87 



vegetable kingdom of his own little planet, at every 

 footfall he treads upon a mystery, and on every side 

 his intellect is overmatched by each tiny flower and 

 every blade of corn ! 



The wide range of climate in which Indian corn 

 can be grown to maturity necessarily occasions a 

 marked difference in the length of its season, or the 

 time it requires for ripening. This period varies from 

 two months to six or seven ; and some precocious 

 kinds, in high latitudes, are found to ripen in less 

 than sixty days. 



The average rate of daily increase in the size of 

 the stalk, during the period of growth, differs with 

 the climate, the soil, and the variety of grain. In 

 some observations made by the author, the growth 

 was found to be seventy inches in fifty days, being an 

 average of one and four-tenth inches per day. The 

 greatest increase noticed in a single week was twenty- 

 two inches, and in a single day four and a half inches. 

 Some of the largest varieties, especially in warmer 

 latitudes, would probably show a more rapid growth 

 than this. 



But an increase of even four inches in twenty-four 

 hours, though small when compared with some other 

 instances of vegetable growth, is yet, in one aspect, 

 curious and remarkable. The movement of this in- 

 crease, which is equal to an inch in six hours, slow as it 

 seems comparatively, may be converted, under a pow- 

 erful lens, into a velocity of two inches, or more, per 

 minute a rate of motion easily detected by the eye. 



In thus bringing the movement of vegetable growth 



