476 THE ROYAL FAMILIES OF PLANTS. 
Locust, especially where at all stunted or neglected, is a 
tree that a cat can hardly climb, bristling and horrid, a 
perfect chevaux-defrise of thorns; and the Hog Peanut 
glides over and round the bushes, where it climbs with a 
stem hardly strong enough to bear its own foliage, a half 
invisible thread of green. The Bauhinias bind themselves 
round the great South American trees like ropes of wire; 
the Wistarias climb and revel in the Chinese thickets like 
grape-vines; while the Sensitive Briar creeps timidly 
among the herbage of the Carolinas, and the graceful 
little Tare intrudes in northern fields, presuming on its 
good looks for a chance of renewed impertinence. They 
are hardly as partial to maritime situations, yet the Beach 
Pea loves no place so well as its “home by the deep, deep 
sea,” and the Wild Bean equally delights to hang its 
wanton herbage over bluffs where it can hear the scream 
of gulls, and see the fisherman casting his lines, hardly 
more twisted than its own. 
_ As hinted already, the nobility is very different from 
that of the Asterids. That family surprises us by its 
inutility ; this overwhelms us by its wonderful wealth. 
There is hardly a thing of any use to man that is not, 
somewhere or other, produced by this family. The other 
was the royalty of blood and self-complacency ; this is 
that of profusion, extravagance, abundance without limit 
or stint. We are not writing a volume, and so will not 
try any enumeration of the duonenne products here to be 
found; but do we desire fine timber? We may take our 
choice of Rosewood, West India Locust, Itaka-wood, 
Purple-heart, Acacia-wood, Mora-wood, and a score of 
others, not forgetting our own Locust, whose fibre defies 
almost every destroying agent but the borer. 
Or would we prefer dyes? Logwood and Indigo, Gum 
