148 LEAVES FROM THE BOOK OF NATURE. 



and green pastures, which we miss so sadly in the sunny 

 South. More varied, and of higher order, is the flora of 

 the temperate zone, though not approaching in luxurious 

 abundance and gorgeous brilliancy the splendor of the 

 torrid zone. But what can compensate for the periodical, 

 anxiously awaited, reawakening of nature, at the first breath 

 of the mild air of spring 1 ? What is more beautiful than 

 the fresh evergreen foliage of firs and cypresses, so rare 

 in the tropics, which cheer up the desolate winter land- 

 scape, and loudly tell the nations of the north, that, 

 though snow and ice cover the earth, the inward life of 

 plants is never extinguished, and that spring will come 

 after winter as surely as eternity comes after death? The 

 great leading features of the temperate zone are its vast 

 plains and steppes, which the eye of man cannot compass, 

 arid where he feels himself, as on the high sea, face to 

 face with his Maker. These large prairies, or savannahs, 

 are covered with luxuriant, waving grass, expressive of all 

 that is cheerful in their airy grace and tremulous lightness. 

 In other regions, strange, fantastic-looking soda plants, suc- 

 culent and evergreen, strike the eye and dazzle it with 

 their brilliant, snow-white crystals or, as on Russian 

 steppes, plants of all kinds are so densely crowded on 

 the unmeasured plain, that the wheels of the traveller's 

 carriage can but with difficulty crush them, and he him- 

 self is half buried in the close, high forest of grasses, too 

 tall to allow him to look around. 



In the torrid zone all vegetable life attains the highest 

 development, from the exclusive and constant union of a 

 high temperature with abundant moisture. Here we find 



