THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM. 473 



But such an exuberance of life is only very ephemeral. 

 A button two inches round is transformed into a flower 

 a foot in circumference. A few minutes have sufficed to 

 unfold one of the marvels of Flora's empire ; a few minutes 

 will equally suffice to destroy it. Towards midnight every 

 part of this nuptial couch, so brilliant and perfumed, fades 

 and totally decays. 



What animal displays an organic force at the same 

 time so active and so fleeting? Not one, and yet we 

 have never bestowed a thought on it. This splendid 

 flower lives moi'e in a few hours than does a mollusc in a 

 whole year. 



Among divers plants endowed with sensibility, there is 

 not one which vibrates and moves with such animation 

 as the queen of the mimosas, the Mimosa pudica. Should 

 the slightest touch stir only one of its leaflets, the whole 

 of them shut up; then in a few seconds the branches 

 droop successively towards the earth, and the plant dis- 

 plays signs of the most profound disturbance, appearing 

 as if struck by lightning. 



In vain have certain botanists tried to explain this 

 extraordinary phenomenon through the intervention of 

 chemico-physical forces ; it is evident that we have only 

 to deal here with a vital manifestation. 



If we preserve a sensitive plant from being shaken, and 

 jDlace upon one of its leaves a drop of acid, the contact 

 of the irritant suffices to make the whole plant shrink up ; 

 and if we mei-ely heat one of its little leaflets by placing 

 it in the focus of a burning-glass, the injury seems to be 

 felt through every part of the fragile Mimosa; its boughs 

 and leafage sink down as though it were struck by stupor. 



This charming leguminous plant, the subject of so many 

 ingenious comparisons, possesses a delicacy of sensation 



