136 Introdtictory Vieso of the 



size for paper-hangers and book-binders, and a cephalic snufF; 

 and the husks are employed in the tanning of leather. The 

 wood is not particularly valuable, but the bark is sometimes used 

 in cases of fever. It is extraordinary that the many uses which 

 experiment has shown may be made of this tree, its easy cul- 

 tivation, and remarkably quick growth, should not have excited 

 more attention in this speculating age, and that there should 

 not have been a Joint-stock Allite7-ative Company for the manu- 

 facture of starch, soap, size, snuff, and shoes. The tree 

 attains its full growth in about fifteen years from the first 

 vegetation of the nut; its operations are, indeed, remark- 

 ably active for so bulky a tree : naked, clumsy, and heavy as 

 it looks during the winter, no sooner does the sun melt away 

 the cement by which the scales are bound together than the 

 tree starts immediately into leaf; and it is understood that 

 the spring shoots complete their growth in the space of three 

 weeks. 



I have spoken at some length of this tree, my dear reader ; 

 for the class to which it belongs is so small, that were I not 

 to linger a little over the plants which I mention, you might 

 be likely to forget that I had spoken of the class at all. Let 

 me observe, by the way, that there are three numbers with 

 which botany is by no means familiar; seven, nine, and 

 eleven. 



Another well known plant of this class and order is the 

 Calla aethiopica, commonly called the arum. The fine white 

 flower of this plant, so generally admired, is, as I have before 

 observed, without the corolla ; what is commonly taken for 

 such being the calyx ; that species of calyx botanically termed 

 a spatha. The column rising in the midst of it is styled a 

 spadix, a name given to the receptacle of the flowers of palms, 

 and extending to very few others. 



- The genus Septas, of the order Heptagynia^ is a remark- 

 able instance of the prevalence of the number seven, in 

 which, as Rousseau observes, " nature seems to take no 

 delight." It has seven stamens, seven pistils, a calyx of seven 

 segments, a corolla of seven petals, and seven capsules. 



The eighth class, Octdndria, comprises many genera, very 

 different in their general aspect : in some plants you may 

 detect the class to which they belong at a glance ; but in the 

 octandrous plants the young botanist must have recourse to 

 the Linnean characters before he can have any notion of their 

 place in the artificial system, several natural families being 

 here united. The student would not be led, by their external 

 appearance, to suppose that the heath, the nasturtium, and 

 the maple tree were included in the same class and order ; 



