2C4 



SCIENCE OF GARDENING. 



Part II. 



crowd of genera believed to belong only to countries of the north. Thus the inhabitant 

 of the equinoctial regions views all the vegetable forms which nature has bestowed around 

 him on the globe. Earth developes to his eyes a spectacle as varied as the azure vault 

 of heaven, which conceals none of her constellations." The people of Europe do not 



69 



enjoy the same advantage. The languishing plants, which the love of science or luxury 

 cultivates in our hot-houses, present only the shadow of the majesty of eqvinoctial vege- 

 tation ; but by the richness of our language, we paint these countries to the imagination, 

 and individual man feels a happiness peculiar to civilisation. 



956. The features of many plants are so obvious and characteristic, as to strike every 

 general observer. The scitaminea?, tree-heaths, firs, and pines, mimosae, climbers, cacti, 

 grasses, lichens, mosses, palms, equisitaceae, arums, pothos, dracontium, &c. the chafFy- 

 leaved plants, malvaceaj, orchidca;, liliacere, &c. form remarkable groups distinguishable 

 at first sight. Of these groups, the most beautiful are the palms, scitamineae, and liliaceo", 

 which include the bamboos and plantains, the most splendid of umbrageous plants. 



957. The native countries of plants may often be discovered by their features in the same 

 manner as the national distinctions which are obsei-vable in the looks and color of man- 

 kind, and which are effected chiefly by climate. Asiatic plants are remarkable for their 

 superior beauty ; African plants for their thick and succulent leaves, as in the case of the 

 cacti ; and American plants for the length and smoothness of their leaves, and for a sort 

 of singularity in the shape of the flower and fruit. The flowers of European plants are 

 but rarely beautiful, a great proportion of them being amentaceous. Plants indigenous 

 to polar and mountainous regions are generally low, with small compressed leaves ; but 

 widi flowers large in proportion. Plants indigenous to New Holland are distinguishable 

 for small and dry leaves, that have often a shrivelled appearance. In Arabia they are low 

 and dwarfish ; in the Arcliipelago they are generally shrubby and furnished with prickles ; 

 while in the Canary Islands many plants, which in other countries are merely herbs, 

 assume the port of sliiubs and trees. Tlie shrubby plants of the Cape of Good Hope 

 and New Holland exhibit a striking similarity, as also the shrubs and trees of the northern 

 parts of Asia and America, which may be exempUfied in the platanus orientalis of the 

 former, and in platanus occidentaHs of the latter, as well as in fagus sylvatica and fagus 

 latifolia, or acer cappadocium and acer saccharinum ; and yet the herbs and under- 

 shrubs of the two countries do not in the least correspond. " A tissue of fibres," Hum- 

 boldt observes, " more or less loose — vegetable colors more or less vivid, according to 

 the chemical mixture of their elements, and the force of the solar rays, are some of the 

 causes which impress on the vegetables of each zone their characteristic features." 



958. The influence of the general aspect of vegetation on the taste and imagination of a jieojile 

 — the difference in this respect between the monotonous oak and pine forests of the 

 temperate zones, and the picturesque assemblages of palms, mimosas, plantains, and 

 bamboos of the tropics — the influence of the nourishment, more or less stimulant, 

 peculiar to different zones, on the character and energy of the passions : — these, Humboldt 

 observes, unite the history of plants with the moral and political history of man. 



