2 1 8 The Great World's Farm 



balsam is one of these. But the sand-box tree of Barba- 

 does is much more energetic. Its fruit is rather Hke a 

 small melon in shape, but hard and woody, and when ripe 

 it bursts with a loud report. One of these — dried very 

 gradually in the hope of its remaining intact — exploded 

 nine months after it was gathered, and so violently as to 

 break the wooden box in which it was kept quite to pieces. 

 The seeds were scattered in all directions, but would of 

 course have been carried very much further had they been 

 unconfined. 



The fruit of the squirting cucumber has to be bound 

 round with copper-wire when ripe, to prevent its shooting 

 out its seeds. 



The pods of the Chinese wistaria also explode with a 

 sharp, loud report, and the seeds may be carried at least 

 thirty feet; while those of the American witch-hazel are 

 shot out to a distance of from twenty to five-and-forty 

 feet. If, when these and other similar seeds are dis- 

 charged, a strong wind should happen to be blowing, they 

 may of course be carried much further. 



Even individual seeds transported by the wind do not 

 always accomplish the whole of their journey **all in a 

 breath"; for the wind comes in successive waves, not in 

 one continuous blast. 



Of course, the lighter the seeds, the better chance they 

 have of being carried far, unless they are caught in these 

 ways; and some few seeds, such as those of the orchids, 

 are so exceedingly minute and light, that no mere lull in 

 the wind is enough to make them drop, for they manage to 

 float even in the still, draughtless air of a hot-house. In 

 this respect they resemble the spores of ferns, mosses, and 

 fungi, which can hardly come to the ground at all except 



