PART I. 



OBJECTS PROM THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM. 



" Search out the wisdom of Nature, there is depth in all her doings. 

 She hath on a mighty scale a general use for all things ; 

 Yet hath she specially for each its microscopic purpose. 

 There is use in the prisoned air that swelleth the pods of the laburnum, 

 Design in the venomed thorns that sentinel the leaves of a nettle, 

 A final cause for the aromatic gum that congealeth the moss around 



a rose, 

 A reason for each blade of grass that raiseth its small spine." 



Proverbial Philosophy. 



" On every herb on which you tread 

 Are written words which, rightly read, 

 Will lead you from earth's fragrant sod 

 To hope and holiness and God." Anon. 



CHAPTER I. 



IN every collection of objects for the microscope we find 

 many preparations from the vegetable world slides of 

 cuticles, fibro-cells, pollen-grains, raphides, &c., &c. ; and few 

 lose more in being hastily looked at, as merely pretty 

 objects, without that knowledge of flower-life which alone 

 can enable us rightly to appreciate them. 



If we are wholly ignorant of the structure of plants, their 

 uses, their variety, and the secret mechanism by which their 

 life is renewed day by day, we are apt to look at these slides 

 for mere amusement, for the lust of the eye, pleased as a 

 child or as a savage with strange forms or brilliant colours. 

 Therefore, before we take them up, it will not be unprofit- 

 able to learn if we do not know, and refresh our memory if 

 we have once known, something of the mysteries of creation 

 in vegetable life. 



