58 LEAVES FROM THE BOOK OF NATURE. 



discovered or newly settled. It shows us in indelible 

 signs the silent, irresistible force with which humble plants 

 prescribe their path on earth to both the animals that 

 feed us and the different races of men. For such is the 

 strange relation between plants and man : they are of 

 paramount importance for his existence not only, but also 

 for his welfare. It is little to say that they feed and 

 clothe him, and that they enable him to sustain the life 

 of those animals, from whom he receives in return not 

 only food and comfort, but, what is incomparably more 

 valuable, service, affection, and gratitude! The cerealia 

 have become the first, and most binding social tie between 

 men, because their culture and preparation require vast 

 labor and mutual service. As no society, moreover, can 

 exist without laws, it may well be said, that these short- 

 lived grasses are in truth the first cause of all legisla- 

 tion. Not without good reason, then, was it that the 

 Romans called their Ceres not only a goddess, but also 

 a legislator. 



To the careless observer, animals seem to be as per- 

 manent features in Nature as plants. Apparently the 

 same sparrow picks up grains of wheat in the harvest- 

 field that robbed our cherries in early summer, and the 

 same game which our forefathers hunted, tempts us now 

 in field and forest. 



It is, however, not so. The demoralized domestic an- 

 imals, it is true, are nearly the same now that they ever 

 were ; the same sheep of whom " Abel was a keeper," 

 sleep night after night on our pastures, and the "cattle 

 on a thousand hills" rove now on our plains. But all 



