the plant. In this, the requisite protection is effec- 
ted differently. When the flower falls, the calyx 
closes over the naked seeds, and shields them from 
injury. Its shape is most singular, being nearly 
that of a helmet with a crest. When the seeds be- 
come ripe they are not discharged by the opening 
again of the original orifice of the calyx, but by the 
separation of the little dish-like superior appendage 
of the helmet. 
We oftentimes imagine that the numerous pecu- 
liarities of organization exhibited in the works of 
creation, stand out as so many reflections on the 
indolence of the human mind in the consideration 
of a Creator. They are marks of omnipotence, 
jftominent every where, to arrest man’s attention, and 
ask a moment’s meditation on the first great cause. 
Professor Stewart beautifully says, “When a man 
has succeeded, at length, in cultivating his imagi- 
nation, things, the most familiar and unnoticed, dis- 
close charms invisible to him before. The same 
objects and events, which were lately beheld with 
indifference, occupy now all the powers and capa- 
cities of the soul ; the contrast between the present 
and past, serving only to enhance and to endear so 
unlooked-for an acquisition. What Gray has finely 
said of the pleasures of vicissitude, conveys but a 
faint image of what is experienced by the man, who 
after having lost, in vulgar occupation and vulgar 
amusement, his earliest and most precious years, is 
thus introduced, at last, to a new heaven and a new 
earth.” 
“ ’Tis this that makes the barren waste appear 
A fruitful field, each grove a paradise.” 
Hort. Kew. 2, v. 3, 427. 
