Food from the Soil 143 



France, where heather is sometimes to be seen actually 

 thriving on a limy soil. 



Some plants have such peculiar tastes, or require- 

 ments, in respect of soils, that they must seldom, one 

 would think, be able to gratify them ; and one almost 

 wonders where the seeds come from when the oppor- 

 tunity for growing does arrive. 



Some, for instance, are never to be seen except after 

 forest -fires ; apparently because they require wood- 

 ashes to grow in. Other plants have similar likings ; 

 and it was observed that after the fires of London and 

 Copenhagen, plants of the same kinds grew among the 

 ruins of both cities. 



It is very remarkable, too, what slight, and even 

 imperceptible, differences in the soil will make very 

 great differences in the crops grown upon them. This 

 is especially noticeable in the case of vines. Tokay 

 wine, for instance, cannot be made except from grapes 

 grown in the one district from which it takes its name. 

 The vines may be grown elsewhere, but the wine is 

 different. So, too, in France ; vineyards growing side 

 by side, and separated only by a narrow footpath, 

 having the same aspect, and apparently the same soil, 

 and cultivated in precisely the same way, yet produce 

 wine of quite different qualities and very different 

 values. 



Plants differ, too, extremely, among other things, as 

 to the quantity of salt which they take up. To corn, 

 and most other plants, any large quantity is absolutely 

 fatal. Some, however, take up much. 



On the west coast of France grow various species ol 

 the small plants called, from their love of salt, salt- 

 worts, which are interesting because, though they are 



