230 SCIENTIFIC ILLUSTRATIONS [Mor 



a longer or shorter struggle one predominates. The spectacle 

 afforded by the wonderful energies prisoned within the compass 

 of the microscopic hair of a plant, which we commonly regard 

 as a merely passive organism, is not easily forgotten by one who 

 has watched its display, continued hour after hour, without 

 pause or sign of weakening. Currents similar to those of the 

 hairs of the nettle have been observed in a great multitude of 

 very different plants, and weighty authorities have suggested 

 that they probably occur in more or less perfection in all young 

 vegetable cells. If such be the case, the wonderful noon-day 

 silence of a tropical forest is, after all, due only to the dulness 

 of our hearing ; and could our ears catch the murmur of these 

 tiny maelstroms as they whirl in the innumerable myriads of 

 living cells which constitute each tree, we should be stunned as 

 with the roar of a great city. L. s. 



Mistaken Identity. 



The yellow gum-tree of Western Australia has been com- 

 pared to a tall native black man with a spear, and to those who 

 have seen it the resemblance is complete. The author of 

 " Gatherings of a Naturalist in Australia," says that he has even 

 seen a fellow-traveller " cooing " to one of these trees to make 

 an inquiry. For this reason the trees are often called " Black- 

 boys." We have seen in England cases of mistaken identity 

 quite as amusing. For instance, we have sometimes observed 

 in a court of law a man dressed up in all the habiliments of a 

 judge, and sitting as a judge would be expected to sit. We 

 have heard counsel professionally " cooing " to him, yet all the 

 time the gentleman has been only a jester, or an advocate, and 

 no more a judge than the yellow gum-tree was a black boy. 

 The great Tichborne trial was a good illustration of this kind 

 of thing. The position in which a tree or a man is placed, and 

 outside appearances, often conspire to produce an hallucination. 



G. 



Morality affected by Weather. 



We are played upon by external influences. Vice may be 

 developed by the breezes. Atmospheric changes may affect even 



