144 
MANGROVE. 
tend on all sides, and are thickly covered with oval 
shining leaves, about five or six inches long. The 
trunk and the lower branches send out several 
round flexible shoots, which descend to the ground, 
and there take root. These shoots, in time, be- 
come so interlaced as to produce an almost impene- 
trable grove, somewhat resembling the banyan tree, 
but much thicker. 
There is something exceedingly curious in the 
manner which Nature has chosen to conduct the 
seed of the mangrove to the earth. It is a remarka- 
ble deviation from the general rule, and is simply 
thus : the fruit produces a single seed enclosed in 
an oval capsule, which, when ripe, begins to ger- 
minate without falling from the tree. A little ra- 
dicle makes its appearance from the top of the cap- 
sule, from whence it proceeds in the form of a ligne- 
ous fibre till it is more than a foot long. In this 
state the seed hangs pendent, till by its weight, 
added to the continual oscillations to which it is 
.iv" 
subject from the slightest breath of air, it is disen- 
gaged from the capsule, and falls to the ground. 
The process which follows is common to other 
seeds. Several fibres shoot from one end of the 
seed ; the two cotyledons are forced open ; the plu- 
mule, or young plant, bursts from between them, 
supported in its growth by their nourishing juice, 
till the fibres are converted into roots sufficiently 
strong to carry on the subsequent process of vege- 
tation. The seeds are said to fall so as to rest on 
the earth in a vertical position : this may easily 
