PREFACE Vll 



to them elegant idleness ; and yet to-day the granaries of the world 

 are more richly stored because men like these have bent over the 

 'flowers of the field. These are the men to whom Nature loves to 

 whisper her secrets, and it is to men of this stamp that Nature 

 gives the power to make two blades grow where before there was 

 but one. 



It is sober truth to say that if plant-life were well taught in our 

 schools, the produce of Australasian fields would be doubled. To 

 statesmen who are at their wit's end to find revenue, this plan for 

 doubling the revenue of a State may be commended. 



Much of the teaching in the book has been put into the ques- 

 tions and exercises at the end of each chapter. Pains have been 

 taken with these, because the information given in the book will 

 be of little value unless there be constant personal observation, 

 experiment and thought. 



One important result of plant -study will be an increase of interest 

 in tree-planting. Only second to this will be the growth of a 

 conscience in our people about the native trees that still remain to 

 us. When people understand what a great tree means, and how 

 even a tree fern takes 50 years to grow, they will no longer be the 

 vandals they have been in the past. 



Every teacher must have noticed that a child speaks of a plant 

 as if it could plan and feel and even think like a human being. If 

 we are to meet the child on his own ground, we must to some 

 extent adopt this way of speaking. This will do no harm if the 

 child is gradually taught, as it grows older, that the plant's power 

 of action and change is limited by laws fixed by the Creator. 



It is worthy of note, however, that a plant is able to change its 

 form and habits in ways not dreamt of by our fathers. One of 

 our native geraniums is the same plant that one finds in Europe ; 

 but the finer climatic conditions have enabled it to change from 

 an annual to a perennial. Striking changes occur when some 

 plants are taken from the interior to the coast, or from the plains 

 to the mountains. The changes made in flowers by the agency of 

 insects are recorded in the rocks, and the transformations wrought 

 upon flowers and vegetables by the gardener are before our eyes 

 daily. Changes like these are due to the power that a plant 

 possesses of adapting itself to its surroundings. What this power of 

 adaptation is we do not know ; we can only say that the Creator 

 has given to the plant the power to change within certain limits. 

 A plant is not a musical box that can play its tunes in one way and 

 in no other. The plant can play its tune with many variations 

 according to its surroundings. 



