VEGETABLE AND ANIMAL ASTROLOGY. 817 
mens) emanate from the aromas of Saturn. Among others, the 
horse-chestnut and the buckwheat, the red cereal grain. 
The horse-chestnut of India is the emblem of the fine soldier, 
bedizened with embroidery — the soldier of the army of parade, of 
the army brilliant with gilding and epaulettes — remarkable for its 
perfect drill and its fine appearance under arms, but dangerous 
from its expensive uselessness and the numerous vermin of com- 
missaries, and suttlers, or camp parasites, which it feeds and pro- 
tects . . . The buckwheat, whose stimulating grain, spared by 
the flail, sows the ardor of mortal combats among the plumed 
gentry of the poultry yard ; the buckwheat also symbolizes a war- 
rior, but a warrior of another stamp. 
The cavalry soldier has not yet contracted the habit of feeding 
his courser with a quart or two of buckwheat on the morning of a 
day of battle ; but let him try this procedure, and tell me what he 
thinks of it. The man of nature, the simple and candid country- 
man, has long made use of it to give eye to the beasts which he 
carries to market. 
This family character, this character of emulation and contest, 
will.be found again in the pear, another glorious creation of Sat- 
urn’s, the high-flavored fruit with reddish leaves, and of number- 
less series, which gives full development to all the rivalries of taste. 
That red, shining, sonorous metal of which cannon, bells, and clar- 
ions are made ; those war-trumpets, whose shrill notes vibrate so 
agreeably on the ear of the horse ; copper, is of Saturn. 
If copper, distinguished by so many brilliant qualities, is also 
venomous, it is the fault of the earth and of false morality that 
governs it, for it is false morality that causes ambition to urge men 
to crime, instead of urging them to virtue, its natural function. 
Come the epoch when ambition shall urge men only to glory, and 
copper will leave its treacherous qualities at the bottom of the 
crucible. 
The cardinal planet has produced the horse and the tiger ; the 
ambiguous planet Proteus has produced the dwarf horse of Afri- 
ca, the domestic cat, and the quince. 
It is known that astronomers have hitherto forgotten to discover 
the ambiguous planet Proteus. 
