ALOE. 



the suckefs, you find them very moist where they are 

 broken from the mother-root, they should lie in a dry 

 shady place for a week before they are planted. When 

 planted, treat them like the old plants. Such kinds as do 

 not afford plenty of offsets may generally be propagated 

 by taking off some of the under leaves, laying them to dry 

 for ten days or a fortnight, and planting them, putting 

 that part of the leaf which adhered to the old plant about 

 an inch or an inch and a half into the earth. This should 

 be done in June. 



There are few things, I believe, more venerable, more 

 eloquently impressive in their antiquity, than an old tree. 

 The ruins of an old and noble edifice, of which every shat- 

 tered fragment, every gaping cranny, complains of the de- 

 structive hand of time, is young and modern in our eyes, 

 compared with that which still survives its touch, the old 

 ivy, that still, with every succeeding year, moves slowly on, 

 knitting its creeping stalks into every crevice, and carrying- 

 its broad leaves up to the very summit. What can be more 

 venerable than the far- spreading roots of an old elm or 

 oak tree, veining the earth with wood ! Cross but that little 

 piece of wood, called the wilderness, leading from Hamp- 

 stead towards North End, where the intermingled roots 

 are visible at every step, casing the earth in impenetrable 

 armour, and forming a natural pavement, apparently as old 

 as time itself can all the antiquities of Egypt command a 

 greater reverence ? 



The larger species of Aloe, from the immensity of its 

 size, and the known slowness of its growth, must speak 

 the same impressive language. Mr. Campbell has put it in 

 a noble attitude for the occasion : 



" Rocks sublime 



To human art a sportive semblance bore, 

 And yellow lichens colour'd all the clime 

 Like moonlight battlements, and towers decay 'd by time. 



