WATER-LILIES 107 
water-lily, it would be wrong to leave our mod- 
est species without due mention of its rarest 
and most magnificent relative, at first claimed 
even as its twin sister, and classed as a Nym- 
phzea. I once lived near neighbor to a Victoria 
Regia. Nothing in the world of vegetable exist- 
ence has such a human interest. The charm is 
not in the mere size of the plant, which disap- 
points everybody, as Niagara does, when tried 
by that sole standard. The leaves of the Vic- 
toria, indeed, attain a diameter of six feet ; the 
largest flowers, of twenty-three inches, — four 
times the size of the largest of our water-lilies. 
But it is not the measurements of the Victoria, 
it is its life which fascinates. It is not a thing 
merely of dimensions, nor merely of beauty, but 
a creature of vitality and motion. Those vast 
leaves expand and change almost visibly. They 
have been known to grow half an inch an 
hour, eight inches a day. Rising one day from 
the water, a mere clinched mass of yellow 
prickles, a leaf is transformed the next day to a 
crimson salver, gorgeously tinted on its up- 
turned rim. Then it spreads into a raft of 
green, armed with long thorns, and supported 
by a framework of ribs and crosspieces, an inch 
thick, and so substantial that the Brazil Indi- 
ans, while gathering the seed-vessels, place 
their young children on the leaves ;—yrupe, 
