THE MANSE GARDEN. 109 



regarded as one of the most beautiful of human 

 inventions. Certain parasitical plants which grow 

 upon other trees afford no analogy. In this case 

 the sap of the tree becomes merely the pabulum of 

 the heterogeneous plant : the tree is not converted 

 into the parasite. It is essential to the life of the 

 latter that the tree bear its own leaves, in order to 

 prepare and continue the aliment of the foster plant ; 

 but in the case of budding ah 1 maybe cut off except 

 what grows out of the bud, and thus the whole na- 

 ture and character of the tree are completely changed. 

 Again, the seed of one species of tree is often sown 

 by the winds, or otherwise, on the cleft of one of 

 another species ; but in this case also there is a total 

 want of analogy, for the decayed moss, and debris 

 of old bark washed down by the rains into the cleft, 

 constitute merely the alluvial soil in which the seed- 

 ling grows. Thus the mountain-ash may be seen 

 growing, as it were, out of the sycamore, or the 

 sycamore out of the body of the mountain-ash; but 

 these trees are not, by such natural process, mutually 

 convertible the one into the other. But by the art 

 of budding or grafting, the mountain-ash may become 

 the stock on which no other leaf than that of the 

 pear shall be suffered to unfold itself, and from which 

 an abundant crop of pears may be gathered. Al- 

 though nature, so far as I know, presents nothing 

 in her operations analogous to the art in question, 

 yet there may be observed in her proceedings some 

 things which might suggest experiments in that art. 

 In the dense forest, owing to the crowding and 

 crossing of branches, an accidental union is some- 

 times exhibited : the winds cause friction, by which 



