EARLY FLOWERS. 107 



tion of carbon from the compounds in which it exists, 

 is the principal action of vegetables, and whether that 

 is taken in by the roots or the leaves, it must be in 

 a state of exceedingly minute division, as the pores in 

 the roots of plants are remarkably small, smaller than 

 the orifices of the absorbents in an animal; and though 

 carbon in the finest powder that art can produce has 

 been applied directly to the roots, and a copious sup- 

 ply of water given, the most microscopic particle of it in 

 substance has never been detected in the plant. When 

 plants begin to decay, we have abundance of chemical 

 decompositions that we can understand, imitate, and 

 apply to many useful purposes in the arts, though 

 many of them are neither very pleasant nor very 

 healthful, and the action of the mature plant is, as we 

 have said, of a very doubtful character ; but the air 

 that comes from the infancy of vegetation is always 

 healthy and invigorating. 



And then there are so many associations connected 

 with it : we are to have architecture, and music, and a 

 number of arts, with many displays of affection, from 

 which it might not be amiss to take lessons. We catch 

 the first flower of the season, too, the little snow-drop 

 (galanthus nivalis), haply rearing its tiny bell through 

 the lingering snow, under some hedge or bank, and as 

 that has now become soft and covered with the fine 

 mould, which it is to have as a return to the spot upon 

 which it has lingered the longest, the flower has the 

 advantage in whiteness. Though the snow-drop has 

 got the credit, on account of its extreme beauty, and 

 the delightful little glades and grassy banks in which 

 it delights, it is not the earliest even of those wild 



