float on the furface of the water, and are furnished with an elaftic, fpiral, ftalk, which extends or contracts as the water rises or falls: this rife or fall, from the torrents which flow into the river, often amounting to many feet in a few hours. The flowers of the male plant are produced under water; and, as foon as the fecundating farina is mature, they separate themselves from the plant; rife to the surface; and are wafted by the air, or borne by the currents, to the female flowers.". Our attention in this narrative will be directed to two particulars; first to the mechanism, the "elaftic, spiral, stalk,” which lengthens or contracts itself according as the water rifes or falls; secondly, to the provifion which is made for bringing the male flower, which is produced under water, to the female flower, which floats upon the furface.

"The

II. My fecond example I take from Withering. Arrang. vol. ii. p. 209. ed. 3. cufcuta europaa is a parafitical plant. feed opens, and puts forth a little fpiral body,

The

which does NOT feek the earth to take root; but climbs in a spiral direction, from right to left, up other plants, from which, by means of veffels, it draws its nourishment.' The "little

"little spiral body" proceeding from the feed is to be compared with the fibres which feeds send out in ordinary cafes; and the comparifon ought to regard both the form of the threads and the direction. They are ftraight; this is fpiral. They fhoot downwards; this points upwards. In the rule, and in the exception, we equally perceive defign.

III. A better known parafitical plant is the evergreen shrub, called the miffeltoe. What we have to remark in it, is a fingular instance of compenfation. No art hath yet made thefe plants take root in the earth. Here therefore might feem to be a mortal defect in their conftitution. Let us examine how this defect is made up to them. The feeds are endued with an adhesive quality fo tenacious, that, if they be rubbed upon the smooth bark of almost any tree, they will ftick to it. And then what follows? Roots fpringing from their feeds, infinuate their fibres into the woody substance of the tree; and the event is, that a miffeltoe plant is produced the next winter *. Of no other plant do the roots refuse to shoot in the ground; of no other plant do the feeds pof

• Ib. p. 203.

fefs

fefs this adhesive, generative, quality, when -applied to the bark of trees.

IV. Another inftance of the compenfatory fyftem is in the autumnal crocus or meadow faffron, (cholcicum autumnale). I have pitied this poor plant a thousand times. Its bloffom rifes out of the ground in the most forlorn condition poffible; without a fheath, a fence, a calyx, or even a leaf to protect it: and that, not in the spring, not to be vifited by fummer funs, but under all the difadvantages of the declining year. When we come howeverto look more closely into the ftructure of this plant, we find that, inftead of its being neglected, nature has gone out of her course to provide for its fecurity, and to make up to it for all its defects. The feed-veffel, which in other plants is fituated within the cup of the flower, or just beneath it, in this plant lies buried ten or twelve inches under ground within the bulbous root. The tube of the flower, which is feldom more than a few tenths of an inch long, in this plant extends down to the root. The ftyles always reach the feedveffel; but it is in this, by an elongation unknown to any other plant. All these fingularities contribute to one end.

"As this plant bloffoms

bloffoms late in the year, and, probably, would not have time to ripen its feeds before the access of winter which would deftroy them, Providence has contrived its ftructure fuch, that this important office may be performed at a depth in the earth out of reach of the usual effects of frost *. That is to fay, in the autumn nothing is done above ground but the business of impregnation; which is an affair between the antheræ and the ftigmata. The maturation of the impregnated seed, which in other plants proceeds within a capfule, exposed together with the reft of the flower to the open air, is here carried on, and during the whole winter, within the heart, as we may fay, of the earth, that is, "out of the reach of the ufual effects of froft." But then a new difficulty presents itself. Seeds, though perfected, are known not to vegetate at this depth in the earth. Our feeds therefore, though fo fafely lodged, would, after all, be loft to the purpose for which all feeds are intended. Left this fhould be the cafe, "a fecond admirable provifion is made to raise them above the furface when they are perfected, and to fow them

* Ib. p. 360.

at

at a proper diftance:" viz. the germ grows up in the spring, upon a fruit-stalk, accompanied with leaves. The feeds now, in common with those of other plants, have the benefit of the fummer, and are fown upon the furface. The order of vegetation externally is this. The plant produces its flowers in September; its leaves and fruits in the spring following.

V. I give the account of the dionaa mufcipula, an extraordinary American plant, as fome late authors have related it; but, whether we be yet enough acquainted with the plant to bring every part of this account to the test of repeated and familiar observation, I am unable to fay. Its leaves are jointed, and furnished with two rows of strong prickles; their furfaces covered with a number of minute glands, which fecrete a sweet liquor, that allures the approach of flies. When these parts are touched by the legs of flies, the two lobes. of the leaf inftantly spring up, the rows of prickles lock themselves faft together, and fqueeze the unwary animal to death *." Here, under a new model, we recognise the ancient

Smellie's Phil. of Nat. Hift. vol. i. p. 5.

plan