THE BOOK OF LIME. 
183 
is a little mealiness on the under surface when 
they are in a young state ; at the largest they 
are not more than an inch in length, and they 
are usually smaller than this ; they are de- 
scribed as being veinless and concave. The 
flower heads — which individually somewhat 
resemble those of the groundsel, only of a 
different colour, being white — are collected 
together in bunches, at the top of short lateral 
shoots ; botanically speaking, they are said to 
be collected in little lateral corymbose pani- 
cles. These clusters of small flowers add but 
little to the beauty of the plant, which resides 
chiefly in the foliage. 
The plant is a native of Van Diemen's 
Land. It there grows on the sides of Mount 
Wellington, producing its flowers through the 
first three months of the year. In" our gar- 
dens its blossoms are produced later, being 
perfected in the summer season. It is culti- 
vated in the Horticultural Society's garden. 
The very simplest culture is all that it 
requires. The ordinary soil of the garden is 
sufficiently good for its support. Whenever 
young plants may be required, they are to be 
obtained without any difficulty by means of 
cuttings. 
The specific name, antennaria, appears to 
have been given in allusion to some fancied 
resemblance to the attennas of an insect dis- 
covered in the pappus or appendage to the 
seed. 
THE BOOK OF LIME."" 
We have had " The Book of the Farm," 
and many other works of a practical nature, 
but nothing more important, more useful, nor 
more practical than this volume on the use of 
lime in agriculture. The application of lime 
has been a sort of mechanical process adopted 
in many districts, because the predecessors of 
the present race did so of old ; and because it 
is attended with success in one place, hun- 
dreds have followed the example in other 
places, without the smallest consideration as 
to whether it was good or bad, or simply use- 
less. It was of the highest consequence, 
therefore, to be made acquainted with the 
nature and probable effects of all lime appli- 
cations, and of the different characters of the 
land on which such an addition would be 
profitable or otherwise. The author might 
have called his book " the natural history of 
lime," for he describes it in all the varied 
states of carbonate, sulphate, phosphate, sili- 
cate, and nitrate ; makes us acquainted w r ith 
all its varieties and combinations ; and in- 
* '• On the Use of Lime in Agriculture." By James 
F. W. Johnston, M.A., F.E.SS.L. & E., F.G.S. Black- 
wood & Sons; London and Edinburgh, 1849. 
structs us in all the many ways in which it is 
successfully or otherwise applied ; tells us 
when it ought and ought not to be used, and 
the best modes of using it, and the effects of 
an "overdose" of it; and shows us its action 
as a chemical constituent of the soil ; notwith- 
standing that he says, "Icannot pretend to have 
cleared up everything in connexion with the 
use of this valuable fertilizing agent, but I have 
been able to introduce as much true and plain 
matter as will, 1 think, well repay any young 
farmer who may devote a couple of weeks to 
the perusal of this little work." It is not a 
little astounding to read of the universality 
of this mineral over the surface of the globe, 
and the thousand and one states in which it is 
found. We have found it, according to the 
natural history of crustaceous animals, form- 
ing coral mountains, which are gradually 
built from the bottom of the ocean, until they 
form the rocks on which the largest vessels 
are split, exemplifying 
" What great events from little causes spring." 
But here we have lime in still more minute 
particles, and still more wondrous forms. In 
page 17 we read — 
" A fine chalky mud collects at the bottom 
of a lake, and we fancy it must consist of 
minute particles of carbonate of lime, which 
have formerly been held in solution by the 
water, and have been separated from it by 
some merely mechanical or chemical form of 
deposition. But put a little of this mud 
under the microscope, and it is instantly seen 
to consist of myriads of minute shells, the 
former residences of creatures far too small 
for the human eye to perceive. Take up now 
a drop of the transparent and apparently pure 
water, and dry it upon a bit of glass, a white 
stain will be left almost invisible to the naked 
eye. But examine this stain by the aid of the 
microscope, and in it will be recognised many 
of the same forms as were previously dis- 
covered in the marl. 
" Thus those minute animals still live, 
still swarm in the waters. It is their invi- 
sible shells which, as generation after gene- 
ration died, have collected in such vast quan- 
tities as to form beds of marl of many feet in 
thickness. 
" To these minute creatures the name of 
infusorial animals has been given. Some of 
them are so minute, that a cubic inch of stone 
has been calculated to contain the remains of 
forty-one thousand millions of them — and yet 
deposits composed almost entirely of such re- 
mains have been met with of twenty and 
thirty feet in thickness. How very striking 
it is to find the united labours of these invi- 
sible creatures capable of producing such 
extraordinary effects ! How very little we 
really know of what is going on around us '. 
