254 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 



Other plants move when they are touched, but in 

 a less degree than the sensitive plant. Such are the 

 Dionea, the Oxalis sensitives, and the Onoclea sen- 

 sibilis. 



From the time of Pliny we have been acquainted 

 with the fact of the sensitiveness of certain plants to 

 touch. This naturalist says, that in the environs of 

 Memphis, there was a plant like the acacia, the leaves 

 of which, arranged like plumes, shrunk when they 

 were touched and rose again after a time. This is 

 evidently a sensitive plant, though the precise species 

 is not known. Pliny, however, only quotes Theo- 

 phrastes. 



PLANTS THAT MOVE SPONTANEOUSLY. 

 Desmodium Gyraus. 



All created beings form after all but one great 

 family ; for it is the same spirit that ordained the crea- 

 tion of the whole universe; the same laws direct 

 them ; the same power sustains them ; and all the 

 children of our great mother Nature are brothers, 

 bound to each other by indissoluble ties. From the 

 mineral to the human being, the series rises by im- 

 perceptible degrees ; the same features belong at the 

 same time to all three kingdoms, minerals, plants and 

 animals, forming in truth, the most perfect unity that 

 can be conceived. 



Among plants, those which in particular appear 

 to possess qualities belonging to the higher, the ani- 

 mal kingdom, are the sensitive plants, which exhibit 

 spontaneous motion, whether in the normal state of 



