Leaves and their Work 159 



has blossomed, because it then contains most nitrogen 

 and is most nutritious. For the nitrogenous com- 

 pounds are the flesh-forming part of all food, animal 

 or vegetable. 



They are very much alike in composition, as has 

 been said, and substances which are closely similar 

 may be obtained both from a beef-steak and a cauli- 

 flower ; from the white of an egg and from a cabbage ; 

 from milk curd, and from peas and beans, of which the 

 Chinese do actually make a vegetable cheese. 



Quantity for quantity, a cabbage is, indeed, less 

 nutritious than the white of an egg ; but the 

 cabbage contains a similar substance. It would, how- 

 ever, be necessary to eat a much larger weight of 

 cabbage to obtain as much flesh-forming food as is 

 contained in an egg. 



And then, again, though the nitrogenous compounds 

 obtained from flesh and vegetables are similar — so 

 closely similar even as to appear almost identical — they 

 are not absolutely identical, and it would be rash, 

 therefore, to conclude that they are equally nutritious. 

 For, if one thing be more plain than another, from 

 what has been said in the previous pages, it is the 

 immense importance belonging to little things — to 

 trifles so minute as almost, or quite, to escape detec- 

 tion. 



Let us remember the vineyards growing side by side 

 — the treatment the same, the soil so apparently the 

 same, that the difference cannot be detected — and yet 

 the wine from the one is worth, and fetches in the 

 market, twenty times as much as the other ! The vines 

 being of the same species, and all other things being 

 equally enjoyed by both, it follows that the difference 



