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POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
its fostering oak, are strangers in the land where Virgil sang of 
the golden bough which formed ^Eneas’s passport into the 
infernal regions. His bough was undoubtedly one of Loranthus, 
not of our own true British mistletoe. May we never cease to 
find it green and bright on our orchard and forest trees, 
though they be leafless and bare, adding to the delight of our 
winter walks and our household merrymakings, and may 
every reader of this little paper henceforth find in a spray of 
mistletoe a deeper interest, both scientific and historical, than 
he lias ever done before. 
Fair Plant, a mystery thy birth, 
Thou dost not fix thy home on earth ; 
Eock’d by the winds, fed by the shower — 
Thy cradle is an airy bower. 
No voice of crime in thy leafy dome, 
But the songs of birds to cheer thy home, 
From the wildling crab this branch was riven 
From waving in the breath of heaven. 
Alas, alas ! they have brought it low, 
To the dwellings of care, and pain, and woe. 
Professor Henslow. 
EXPLANATION OF PLATE VIII. 
Fig. 1. Branch of mistletoe, in fruit. 
Fig. 2. Vertical section of an antheriferous or male flower. 
Fig. 3. Female flower in the axils of the leaves and branches. 
Fig. 4. Vertical section of a branch two years old, showing the tissue. 
Fig. 5. Transverse section of the same branch. 
Fig. 6. Vessels forming the ribs or nerves of the young leaves. 
