THE FIK TEIBE. 355 



fluid with facility, owing to the good conducting properties 

 of the fluids which they contain. If a small blade of 

 grass be placed in contact with the conductor of a power- 

 ful electrical machine in operation, the whole of the 

 electricity Avill be found to be carried off" hy the blade of 

 grass. Pointed conductors, and especially vegetable con- 

 ductors, are admirably fitted to receive and disperse elec- 

 tricity, it having been found by experiment that a few 

 blades of grass placed near the brass knob at the top of a 

 Ley den jar will quickly and silently discharge it. It has 

 been found impossible to give an electric shock to a circle 

 of people standing on a lawn, as the electricity took the 

 shorter and better conducting course through the grass ; 

 and it has also been found, that when the electroscope 

 (an instrument for measuring the degree of electricity) 

 indicated abundance of electricity in the free open air, it 

 showed none in the vicinity of a tree with pointed 

 leaves. It is not unfair, therefore, to assume that every 

 one of the myriads of pointed conductors in the Pine 

 forests of ISTorway and Eussia is continually employed in 

 withdrawing electricity from the atmosphere, and con- 

 tributing to promote an equable electrical condition in the 

 atmosphere of places far remote. 



The flowers of the Pine are of two kinds, both of which 

 are of a simple structure, being destitute both of calyx 

 and corolla, and therefore not liable to be torn by the 

 wind. The barren flowers are scaly catkins, and contain 

 an unusual quantity of pollen, which is sometimes carried 

 away by storms, and descends in remote districts in the 

 shape of clouds of sulphur-coloured dust, to the great 

 terror of the superstitious. The fertile flower is a solid 

 catkin, composed of thick overlapping scales, at the base 

 of each of which are generally two ovaries. The whole of 

 the fertile flower is persistent, increasing in size, but not 

 altering materially in shape until it becomes a woody cone. 

 Meanwhile the ovaries have grown into seeds, furnished 

 each with a membranous wing, which, though not buoyant 



