136 PROSERPINA. 



you thankful that the said leafy vase is not of iron ; and 

 is a ship of Life instead of Death. 



11. Already, not once, nor twice, I have had to use 

 the word 'stem,' of the main round branch from which 

 both stalk and cymba spring. This word you had better 

 keep for all growing, or advancing, shoots of trees, 

 whether from the ground, or from central trunks and 

 branches. I regret that the words multiply on us ; but 

 each that I permit myself to use has its own proper 

 thought or idea to express, as you will presently perceive ; 

 so that true knowledge multiplies with true words. 



12. The ' stem,' you are to say, then, \vhen you mean 

 the advancing shoot, which lengthens annually, while a 

 stalk ends every year in a blossom, and a cymba in a leaf. 

 A stem is essentially round,* square, or regularly poly- 

 gonal ; though, as a cymba may become exceptionally 

 round, a stem may become exceptionally flat, or even 

 mimic the shape of a leaf. Indeed I should have liked 

 to write " a stem is essentially round, and constructively, 

 on occasion, square," but it would have been too grand. 

 The fact is, however, that a stem is really a roundly 

 minded thing, throwing off its branches in circles as a 

 trundled mop throws off drops, though it can always order 

 the branches to fly off in what order it likes, two at a 

 time, opposite to each other ; or three, or five, in a spiral 

 coil ; or one here and one there, on this side and that ; 



* I use ; round ' rather than ; cylindrical,' for simplicity's sake. 



