110 The Dittany. 



its wierd reputation. Its motto, * I surmount all difficulty," 

 gives a good specimen of its character. It grows chiefly, it is 

 said, on the summit of fruit trees, though it makes the proud oak 

 sometimes become its slave, and yield its substance to support it. 

 The Druids had a species of admiration for a weakness so supe- 

 rior to strength; the tyrant subjugator of the oak appeared to 

 them alike formidable to men and the gods. In the same tribe 

 we find the largest, and certainly the strangest flower in the 

 world. It was discovered on the stem of a kind of grape vine, 

 by Dr. Arnold, in the island of Sumatra, in 1818 ; he called it 

 the Rafflesia Arnoldi, from the governor's name and his own* 

 He considered it the Titan of the vegetable kingdom, and says, 

 with much truth, that the human mind never had conceived such 

 a flower. The circumference of the fully expanded flower is 

 rather over nine feet; its nectarium calculated to hold nine pints ; 

 the pistils larger than cow's horns, and the entire weight of the 

 blossom, of which alone with its appendages the plant consists, is 

 computed at fifteen pounds. The color is a light orange, ap- 

 proaching to a reddish hue, mottled with a yellowish white. 

 Since Dr. Arnold first discovered it, some other species belong- 

 ing to the same genus, have been discovered in the East, which 

 last fact forms a material help in judging of the truth of the ex- 

 istence of such a plant. The analogy, in this instance, in the 

 vegetable and animal kingdoms, as we have observed in another 

 work, holds good ; the Parasite invariably injures the plant to 

 which it is attached, and repays with the vilest ingratitude the 

 sustenance and support afforded by its friend. We have, in our 

 own history, nourished a viper which fortunately showed the 

 sting before much injury could be effected) and whose memory 

 is always associated with the Missletoes. 



The Dittany. 



The Origanum Dictamnus — Dittany of Crete, is in the 

 class Didynamia, order Gymnospermia. Its specific name is 

 derived from the Greek words meaning a mountain aud rejoice, 

 because it grows in elevated places. Its characters are : strobile 



