IJ'i LETTER XXXIX. 



of minute green flowers {Plate XL. 2. Jig. 1.), which, 

 witliout changing colour, ripen their seeds, and 

 drop them in profusion on the surrounding soil. It is 

 scarcely possible to select a plant more unattractive 

 than this, and yet, if you will attentively study its 

 structure with me, you will find that, in some respects, 

 its beauty is of no common order. 



I have already said that it is an annual ; its stems 

 are angular, and grow about a foot and a half or two 

 feet high, producing a few stiff upright branches. 

 The leaves are of a dull grey green on the upper side, 

 and of a dead glaucous colour on the under side ; they 

 are, moreover, powdered with a loose mealy substance, 

 which spreads indeed over all the parts of the plant 

 exposed to the air, and which seems to be a peculiar 

 cutaneous secretion. Viewed under the microscope, 

 and illuminated by a ray of bright light thro^\^l from 

 above, this secretion gives the plant the most beautiful 

 glittering appearance, every part of the surface being 

 spangled with what seem fragments of emeralds and 

 chrysoprases. The leaves are placed on short stalks, 

 and they have a somewhat lozenge-shaped figure, with 

 several coarse toothings on their edge. 



The flowers are arranged in compact clusters, pro- 

 ceeding from the axils of the leaves. Each, when 

 unexpanded (jig. 2.), is round, depressed, marked with 

 five prominent, rounded angles, bright green, exqui- 

 sitively studded in the hollows between the angles 

 with little glittering balls, which have all the appear- 

 ance of being consolidated dew ; indeed the whole 

 flower-bud has much the aspect of a tiny green sea-egg 



