384 The Evolution of Beauty. [July, 
The blossoming of plants indicates that the climacteric 
of their highest secondary life-wave has been attained. 
From that point reaction and sleep or decay set in. In pe- 
rennials the great primary life-wave keeps its course through 
many flowering seasons ; but there comes one season in 
which its power to blossom is at its height : this is the ulti- 
mate climacteric, and from that point there is gradual decay 
of the whole organism. 
The specific wave, however, does not terminate with the 
individual. It is carried through the seed from generation 
to generation, and its climacteric is not reached until the 
highest blossoming power of the species has been attained. 
When this happens the species itself must gradually pass 
away. 
The four great secondary organic waves, the cellular, the 
osseous, the fibrous, and the nervous, may exist in unequal 
proportions in a specific wave. The cellular is always first 
developed, afterwards the others in succession. But the 
grand climacteric of organic development is not attained 
until all four have reached the highest stage of concentration 
possible to them ; and it is probable that such conditions 
have never yet existed on this earth. 
Geologic history shows us, in vegetable life, first, a won- 
derful development of the cellular wave in the cryptogamic 
type, everywhere predominant ; and then a similar epoch in 
which the osseous wave overtopped the cellular, clothing the 
world with mighty Conifers — huge masses of trunk and 
branches, with little foliage or blossom. 
This was succeeded by an epoch of fibrous development, 
represented in the vegetable world by foliage. Forests of 
the broad-leaved Amentiferse, the oak, the birch, the poplar, 
and the alder, — with elm, and maple, and plane, and other 
trees conspicuous for foliage, but not for blossom, — became 
the striking feature of the landscape. 
Finally, as the nervous wave advanced towards its climax, 
blossom began to be developed in varied and conspicuous 
forms. Magnolias, roses, mallows, lilies, orchids, and many 
other “ flowering ” plants, appear in the latest tertiary de- 
posits ; and plants of this type still adorn the world, and 
probably become more numerous and more beautiful century 
by century. 
It has been shown that plants with inconspicuous blossom 
have the widest geographic range, that those with white 
flowers have a range more limited, while species with bril- 
liantly coloured blossoms have a still smaller range q! 
distribution. Taking the area of distribution to indicate 
