Jeroboam, who caused Israel to sin, sent them as 

 a present to the prophet Ahijah, when he asked 

 of the fate of his sick chikl, are supposed by 

 Kitto to have been a kind of cake, sprinkled 

 oyer in this way with poppy-seeds, as the ori- 

 ginal word implies a spotted cake. 



Poppies are found in all countries, and under 

 all chmates, from the north pole to the sandy 

 deserts of Africa. Brilliant as is our wild scar- 

 let flower, it is much brighter in some other 

 lands. In the corn-fields, in some parts of 

 France, it has a much richer tint than in the 

 English field. 



An interesting phenomenon is sometimes ex- 

 hibited by red and orange-coloured flowers, and 

 also, in a less degree, by yellow-tinted blossoms. 

 It is that of a light of their own colour playing 

 about the plant. This is not the result of au 

 inflammable vapour igniting on the approach of 

 a candle, but seems rather, as Sharon Turner 

 has remarked, "an actual secretion of light ad- 

 ditional to their usual show." The cause of 

 this phenomenon has not been discovered, but 

 it seems dependent on an electrical state of the 

 atmosphere. It has not been seen during the 

 bright sunshine, but has been observed after 

 sunset, in several flowers, as the marigold, the 

 different species of poppy, the scarlet geranium, 

 and even in the heartsease. 



A bright light is given out not by the blos- 

 soms alone of plants ; several roots show a bril- 

 liance in the progress of decay ; this, however, 

 is of a phosphorescent nature. A hmiinosity so 



