108 



POPULAR HISTORY OF LICHENS. 



— here to specify the localities that ought to be searched 

 by the collector. Every roadside wall, every mountain rock 

 or boulder, every sea-side cliff, will furnish to him inex- 

 haustible materials. The timber brought into our wood- 

 yards, the fallen twigs of Firs and other forest-trees col- 

 lected as firewood, the ballast of our ships, our ancient archi- 

 tectural rains, will each be found the habitat of an infinity 

 of interesting species. Not only this; but with a view to 

 a careful study of their origin, development, and decay, 

 Lichens may be sown and cultivated. A few years ago the 

 raising from seed of such plants as Lichens, Mosses, Pungi, 

 or Algse, would not even have been conceived possible; 

 now it is a reality. It appears that Lichens are now being 

 cultivated with great intelligence and success in the Jardin 

 des Plantes of Paris ; and in various parts of Prance con- 

 siderable attention is now being devoted to the cultivation 

 of others of the lower cryptogams, — a circumstance full of 

 significance, as showing the gradual development of the be- 

 lief that the interest of a study cannot be held proportionate 

 to the size of the objects of research, — that a knowledge of 

 the embryology or organology of the simplest plants is a 

 necessary prelude or key to that of higher vegetables, and 

 that cryptogams cannot be properly examined unless in the 

 living state. 



