eee 
2G 
Aloe. 
Agave Americana. Narurat Orver: Amaryllidacee—Amaryllis Family. 
HIS plant is a native of the tropical portions of America, 
although the same species are found in the burning sands of 
the Eastern Hemisphere. The leaves are thick and fleshy, 
tapering to a point, and dentate on the edges. They some- 
times grow as much as six or eight feet in length, each leaf 
coming out one close above the other, with no interval on the 
stem. The flower-stalk rises from the center of the surrounding 
leaves to the height of twenty to thirty feet, bearing on the summit 
a pyramidal panicle of numberless yellow flowers. Formerly it was 
said to bloom only once in a century. It is now known to bloom 
from eight years upward, according to the attention given it, and the 
region where it grows. Another variety, with smaller leaves of 
almost invisible green, is completely covered with white, bead-like 
dots, forming a striking contrast to the color on which they rest. 
Oriel. 
H sorrow! where on earth hast thou not sped 
Thy fatal arrows! on what lovely head 
Hast thou not poured, alas! thy bitter phial, 
And cast a shadow on the spirit’s dial. 
—Anna Estelle Lewis. 
N tears, the heart oppressed with grief, ALF of the ills we hoard within our hearts, 
Gives language to its woes; Are ills because we hoard them.  — Proctor, 
In tears its fullness finds relief, 
When -tapture’s, Hide clerdows! UT where the heart of each should beat, 
Who, then, unclouded bliss would seek There seemed a wound instead of it, 
On this terrestrial sphere, From whence the blood dropped to their feet, 
When e’en delight can only speak, Drop after drop— dropped heavily, 
Like sorrow, in a tear? As century follows century 
—Metastasio, Into the deep eternity. —Zvicabeth Barrett Browning. 
| AM dumb, as solemn sorrow ought to be; 
Could my griefs speak, the tale would have no end. 
. — Otway, 
8 
AD 
