CLASS PENTANDRIA. 
14a 
of 50** on the northern border, and 59° on the southern. Lines of tempeniture 
have been fixed by Humboldt by remarking the peculiar vegetables in different 
latiti des. He has traced the northern limit of the wine-grape, where the mean 
annual temperature is about 50°, across the United States to the Pacific Ocean ; 
not, however, in a straight line, for climate, although chiefly dependent on latitude, 
is yet much modified by other circumstances; and on the western coast of America 
we find in latitude 50° a similar climate to the 43d degree of latitude on the east 
ern coast. Thus, the wine-grape may grow in 50° of latitude near the lakes, the 
Mississippi, and Pacific Ocean ; while in the eastern part of New York and New 
England, it would not thrive beyond the 43d degree of latitude. We find on the 
eastern side of the Atlantic, the region of the wine-grape, including France and the 
southern countries of Europe, extending as high as latitude 50°. The southern 
Umit of the wine-grape is traced from Raleigh, in the United States, in latitude 
35°, to Europe, where it passes between Rome and Florence, in latitude 44° ; this 
hne is the boundary between the grape region and that of the olive and fig, which 
require a warmer climate. The banks of the Rhine produce excellent grapes, 
which are brought down the river in great quantities to the seaports. The festival 
of the Vintage, or the gathering of the grapes, which, like our Thanksgiving season, 
is intended as a manifestation of gratitude for the fruits of the earth, was cele 
brated with much joy by the ancient Romans, and is still observed by the people 
of Italy ; it occurs with them about the beginning of September ; in France and the 
south of Germany it is later. The vines of Italy are often trained upon trees, par- 
ticularly upon the lofty elm. In France the vine is supported by short saphng3^ 
about the length of bean-poles. 
It is said the Persian vine-dressers conduct the vines up the walls of their vine- 
yards, and curl them over on the other side ; this they do by tying small stones td 
the extremity of the tendrils. This practice may illustrate a passage in Genesis : 
Joneph is a fruitful bough; even a fruitful bough by a well ; tohose branches run 
over the wall." " The vine, particularly in Turkey and Greece, is frequently made 
to iiitwine on trellises around a well, where, in the heat of the day, fanlilies collect 
and sit under their shade." 
188. The violet^ genus Yiola, contains many native species 
The garden-violet, Viola i/ri-color^ has a variety of commop 
names, as pansy, heart's-ease, &c. Pansy is a corruption of tx 
French pmsee^ a thought ; thus Shakspeare, in the character ot 
Ophelia, says : 
" There's rosemary — that's for remembrance ; 
And these are pansies — 
That's for thought." 
Shakspeare also calls the same flower, " Love in idleness." The blue violet 
( Viola ccerulia) is found among the first flowers of spring. Our meadows present 
a great variety of beautiful and fragrant violets. The genus Capsicum affords the 
Cayenne pepper, a South American plant, and the red pepper of our gardens. 
The pericarps, when ripe, are of a bright red ; the seeds are attached to a central 
column ; they are heating and stimulating ; valuable in decoction as an antidote to 
Bore throat. The natural order Oonvolvulacece is composed of pentandrious plants ; 
here we find the morning-glory, jalap plant — whose root-stock furnishes the medi- 
cinal part — the cypress- vine, and the sweet potato, or convolvulus batatas ; and yet 
modern botanists say the natural orders bring together plants of similar properties 
climate where the thermometer in summer would rise to 100 degrees, and in winter sinic to zero, or 0, 
the medium would be 50 degrees : this is probably not far from the mean annual temperature of ont 
climate. The mean annual temperature at the equator is reckoned to be about S4 degrees. 
Temperature of the regions which produce the wine-grape — Mean annual temperature {see note)— 
a. What is the natural limit of the wine-grape 1 — How does the climate of the western coast of Ameri 
ca correspond to that of the eastern coast? — Crossing the Atlantic, where do we find the northern and 
■outhern limits of the wine-grape? — Vintage — Wines— Vineyards. — 188. Violet — Capsicum.— Con voU 
valaces. 
