ON ENVIRONMENT 



which, when it was a slab high up on another 



cactus plant, it knew and feared no danger!" 



***** 



Is it more wonderful that, unseen by us, a 

 plant should have adapted itself to the desert 

 and, through the ages, have armored itself against 

 an enemy, than that, before our eyes, in a single 

 year, it should meet changed conditions in an 

 equally effective way? 



Is it more wonderful that it should grow spines 

 than that it should grow slabs which in turn have 

 the power to grow other slabs? 



Is not the really wonderful thing the fact that 



it grows at all? 



***** 



The cactus is one of the most plastic of plants — 

 educated up to this, perhaps, by the hardships 

 and battles through which its ancestry has fought 

 its way. 



A slip cut from a rose bush, for example, 

 must be planted in carefully prepared ground of 

 a suitable kind, at a certain time of the year, with 

 regard to moisture and temperature — it must be 

 watched and cared for until it takes root and 

 begins for itself. Under continued cultivation, the 

 rose bush has lost some of its ability to make its 

 own way. 



But the cactus, having come up from a line 



[23] 



