BOTANY. 



373 



ence that climate exercises upon their devel- 

 opment ; and, isistly, from botany, as now un- 

 derstood in its most extensive signification, is 

 iusepartible the knowledge of the various 

 ways in which the laws of vegetable life are 

 applicable to the augmentation of the Inxu- 

 ries and comforts, or to the diminution of the 

 Wants and miseries of maukhid. It is by no 

 means, as some suppose, a science for the 

 idle philosopiier in his closet ; neither is it 

 merely an amusing accomplishment, as oth- 

 ers appear to think ; on the contrary, its field 

 is in the midst of meadows, and gardens, and 

 forests, on the sides of mountains, and in the 

 depths of mhies ; wherever vegetiition still 

 flourishes, or wlierever it attests, by its re- 

 mains, the existence of a fonner world. It is 

 the science that converts the useli'ss or the 

 noxious weed into the nuti'iiious vegetable ; 

 wliich changes a barren, volcanic rock like 

 Ascension, into a gi-een and fertile island ; 

 and which enables the man of science, by 

 the power it gives him of judging how far the 

 productions of one climate are susceptible of 

 cultivation in another, to guide the colonist 

 in his enterprises, and to save liim li-om those 

 eiTors and losses into wliich all such persons 

 tmacquainted with botany are liable to fall. 

 This science, finally, is that which teaches 

 the physician how to discover in every region 

 the m(?dicines that are best adapted for the 

 maladies that prevail in it; and which, by 

 famishing liim with a certain clue to the 

 knowledge of the ti'ibes in which particular 

 properties are or are not to be found, renders 

 him as much at ease, alone and seemingly 

 without resources, in a land of unknown 

 herbs, as if he were in the midst ol' a maga- 

 zine of drugs in some civilized countr}'." 



This department of science, which is now 

 becoming a .subject of general interest, in 

 consequence of the new views of the economy 

 of Nature in her development of organic be- 

 ing, that have been obtaineil by a deeper in- 

 sight into vegetable anatomy and physiology, 

 cimnot but be more especially valuable to 

 those whose pursuits are so intimately con- 

 nected with the objects of its study, the culti- 

 vators of the soil. There may be, doubtless 

 there are still, many such as those of which 

 we have previously spoken as existing thirty 

 years ago, who in the pride of tlieir ignorance, 

 may laugh at and des[»ise the lessons of the 

 theorist as opposed to old practices, the result 

 of the experience that has been handed dowii 

 from their forefathers; until wakened to slow 

 conviction of tlieir impoitance by the success 

 of tlieir more enterprising neighbors, and 

 then deplore the time they have lost, and 

 which others have occupied in the steady 

 progress to improvement. The views of the 

 merely scientific man may often, it is true, be 

 only speculative ; they may sometimes be in 

 direct opposition U) facts, of which he has 

 himself no direct means of becoming ac- 

 quainted. But who is to test the value of 

 his experiments, unless the m:m of practice ? 

 He alone, in his broader field of inquiry, is 

 (757) 



competent to detect in their action the errors 

 in minutiie that have escaped the notice of the 

 chemist in his laboratory, and the naturalist 

 in his closet; ho chieHy is to derive the bene- 

 fits accruing from their united labors; and a 

 knowledge of the leading principles of their 

 science and of natural philosophy in the ag- 

 gregate will materially assist, nay, is abso- 

 lutely necessary to qualify him ibr both the 

 trial and the benefit. It is surprising that 

 the very evident advantages to cultivation 

 that an acquahitance with the structure and 

 vital function of vegetables promises, shoulil 

 have hitherto been so little estimated by the 

 agriculturist : the practical gardener has far 

 anticipated him in the pursuit of incpiiries 

 e(iu<dly essential to them both ; although, 

 perhaps, himself in the main, .'<till veiy dis- 

 tiuit from acquaintance with a vast body of 

 facts that might be rendered available by his 

 skill. How much, for instance, has a knowl- 

 edge of the organs and attiibutes of the tlower 

 contributed to the advancement of his art ? 

 Let us look at a flower : it is really a compU- 

 cated object ; much more so than many who 

 have long admii-ed and clierishi^d it for its 

 beauty and iragnmce have any idea of; or, 

 if they have, have not thought worthy of ex- 

 amination. Its greatest beauty ct)iisisls not 

 in the gorgeous color, nor its value in the 

 most exquisite odor, but hi the admirable 

 adaptation of its parts, and their subservience 

 to the reproduction of its kind. 



Take any common flower of the field or 

 garden, only obsening tliat, if one of the lat- 

 ter loc-ality, it is not of the kind called 

 " double," which, however admirable as gai-- 

 den ornaments — and not altogether to bo 

 despised by the botimist, on account of the 

 illustrations they afford him of the morbid 

 development of parts to which the individuals 

 of the vegetable kingdom are hable under 

 peculiar circumstances — are not at all calcu 

 lated to display the unity of design that com- 

 stitutes the chief object of interest in a per- 

 fect flower. Externally, investing the base 

 of the flower, is a series of small leaves, nsu- 

 ally of a green color, and from three to five 

 in number, separate, and spreading, as in the 

 buttercup and the peony, or conducted into 

 tlie form of a cup or vase, as in the primrose 

 or pink : this is the cali/x, or flower-cup ; it 

 covers the rest of the flower in the state of 

 bud, and sen'es to support and hokl together 

 the more delicate internal organs when ex- 

 panded. AVithin the calyx is the corolla or 

 blossom, composed of leaves, generally of the 

 same number as those of the calyx, which are 

 either white or variously colored, and called 

 petals ; these are either distinct, as in the 

 rose and the wall-flower, or connected, as in 

 the fox-glove and potaloflower. AVithin the 

 corolla are the stamens, generally thread or 

 wire-like processes, with yellow, or, occa- 

 sionally, jiurplish or reddish tips; these are 

 veiy variable in their size, length and num- 

 ber, in the flowers of different plants ; some 

 flowers have only one or two stamens — in tho 



