n6 



GLIMPSES OF NATURE. 



There is a stern decree of that implacable female, 

 Madre Natura, which declares that parasitism includes 

 the lowering of the form which sacrifices its vital in- 

 dependence to luxurious comfort and inglorious ease. 

 In animals, legs, stomachs, eyes, and other belongings 

 are swept away when the parasite, attaching itself to 

 another animal, is found to have no use for the organs 

 of free and normal existence. This is the penalty of 

 parasitism everywhere degradation and backsliding 



Fig. 25. Mistletoe (yiscwn album), a. Flower ; b. Fruit. 



in the vital scale. Yet in our mistletoe there is one 

 redeeming feature. 



Parasite though it may be, it has still a saving 

 clause in its botanical character. I have before me 

 a piece of an apple-tree's branch. It has been cut 

 through dexterously enough, and the relations of a 

 sprig of mistletoe which has attached itself to the 

 bough are rendered clear and distinct. The mistletoe 

 is not merely a lodger on the apple ; it is a boarder 

 likewise. Like certain dissatisfied tenants nowadays, 

 it insists on holding to its landlord, while it declines 



