retreat of the stamens in another elegant British plant-the grass of Parnassus (Parnassia palustris), not uncommon in moist meadows and upland marshes. When the anthers are young, they stretch forward till they reach the summit of the pistil, where they deposit their fertilizing pollen, and then fall back towards the petals. VEGETABLE CHEMISTRY. SINGULAR EFFECTS OF LIGHT AND DARKNESS.-A plant, which is not uncommon in India, the Cotyledon calycina, changes its properties very remarkably according to the period of the day and night. Upon the whole, the plant may be said to possess an herbaceous taste; but in the morning it is as much, if not more acid, than sorrel, probably from its imbibing oxygen during the night. POISONING OF PLANTS.—Animals are poisoned by introducing deleterious substances into their circulation, either through the organs of digestion or the absorbents; plants in the same way may be poisoned with deleterious substances absorbed by the roots. M. Marcet, of Geneva, tried several interesting experiments on this subject. He watered with two ounces of water, containing twelve grains of oxide of arsenic in solution-a pot containing two or three plants of kidney beans, each of five or six leaves. At the end of from twenty-four to thirty-six hours the plants had faded, the leaves had drooped, and had even begun to turn yellow; the roots remained fresh, and appeared to be living. Attempts to restore the plants after twelve or eighteen hours by abundant watering, failed to recover them. The leaves and stem of one of the dead plants gave, upon chemical examination, traces of arsenic. A branch of a rose-tree, including a blossom, was gathered just as the rose began to blow; the stem was put into a vessel containing a solution of six grains of oxide of arsenic in an ounce of water. The flower and leaves soon shewed symptoms of disease, and on the fifth day the whole branch was withered and dead, though only one-fifth of a grain of arsenic had been absorbed. Similar stems, placed in pure water, had, after five days, the roses fully expanded, and the leaves fresh and green. SELF-SOWN SEEDS.-It is a very remarkable fact, well known to florists, that self-sown seeds usually produce natural flowers, whatever the plant may have been from which they were scattered; that is, however fine in colour, size, or form a flower may have been rendered by cultivation, when it is allowed to shed its seed on the ground, the plants thence arising will again degenerate into the common appearance of its wild original. We have a striking instance of the fact in our own garden at this moment, in the case of the carnation poppy (Papaver rhaus), which is so much admired when double and varied in colour; and we had some last year of numerous shades, and as double as garden roses. Several seedlings from these came up last autumn, and stood the winter, and are just come into flower; but all of them are of the same orange-red tint with the wild corn poppy, and nearly single. Had the seed been saved, and kept out of the ground till spring, the same double flowers, of varied tints, would have been produced. In the case of heart's-ease (Violor tricolor), which sports in so many beautiful varieties, a similar degeneration takes place -the self-sown seeds producing almost uniformly small dingy blossoms, of little beauty, compared with the fine varieties produced by carefully drying the seed, and keeping it for some months out of the ground. Balsam seed, it is said, will not produce fine double-flowered plants unless it be kept for nine years. MIGRATION OF PLANTS.-It is certain that sea plants have frequently been brought, adhering to ships, from the southern to the northern seas; and the contrary, examples of which we have in the Fucus cartilagineus of Turner, the F. natans and the F. bacciferus. West Indian fruits are every year driven on the coast of Norway, and of the Faro Islands, by the gulf stream and south-west storms; among which fruits, cocoa nuts, gourds, and the produce of Acacia Scandens, Piscidia Erythrina, and Anacardin Occidentale are the most common. But though all this be granted, and other facts of a similar kind, we are still far from proving the conclusion, that the migration of plants, and their distribution, from one point, over the surface of the earth, has been the manner in which they have been spread. INSECT-DESTROYING PLANTS.-It is a perplexing matter to reconcile our feelings to the rigour, and our reason to the necessity, of some plants being made the instruments of destruction to the insect world. Of British plants we have only a few so constructed, which, having clammy joints and calyxes, entangle them to death. The sun dew (Drosera) destroys in a different manner, yet kills them without torture. But we have one plant in our gardens, a native of North America, than which none can be more cruelly destructive of animal life, the dogsbane (Apocynum androsæ T the mifolium), which is generally conducive to the death of every fly that settles upon it. Allured by the honey on the nectary of the expanded blossom, the instant the trunk is protruded to feed on it, the filaments close, and, catching the fly by the extremity of its proboscis, detain the poor prisoner writhing in protracted struggles till released by death, a death apparently occasioned by exhaustion alone; filaments then relax, and the body falls to the ground. The plant will at times be dusky from the numbers of imprisoned wretches. This elastic action of the filaments may be conducive to the fertilizing of the seed, by scattering the pollen from the anthers, as is the case with the barberry; but we are not sensible that the destruction of the creatures which excite the action is in any way essential to the wants or perfection of the plant; and our ignorance favours the idea of a wanton cruelty in the herb; but how little of the causes and motives of action of created things do we know! and it must be unlimitable arrogance alone that could question the wisdom of the mechanism of Him" that judgeth rightly;" the operations of a simple plant confound and humble us, and, like the hand-writing on the wall, though seen by many, can be explained but by one. PROPERTIES OF THE ELDER-TREE.-The elder-tree does as much good by its noxious as by its agreeable qualities. If corn or other vegetables be smartly whipped with the branches, they will communicate a sufficient portion of their scent to keep off the insects by which so many plants are frequently blighted. An infusion of the leaves poured over plants will preserve them from caterpillars also. The wine made from the berries is well known; but perhaps it may not be so generally known that the buds make an excellent pickle. A water distilled from the flowers rivals buttermilk itself as a rural cosmetic. In some remote country places it supplies the place both of the surgeon and the druggist; it furnishes ointments, infusions, and decoctions for all ailments, cuts, or bruises. Every part of it serves some useful purpose; the wood, pith, bark, leaves, buds, flowers, and fruit. Its narcotic scent makes it unwholesome to sleep under. INDIAN CORN.-Tortillas, which are a sort of cakes made of Indian corn, are a general article of sustenance in Mexico. They were prepared in precisely the same way as at present before the conquest of that country. The maize, of which the tortillas are composed, is first parboiled, to cleanse and soften the grain, and then, in a quantity sufficient for the day's consumption, is left to cool. For the purpose of crushing or mashing the maize, the women have a large square block of black lava, or basalt, about two feet in length and sixteen inches broad, which stands on two, three, or four legs, so arranged as to give it a gentle slope. There is a very slightly-elevated rim on either side, and the great solidity and weight keep the stone steady, while the operator bruises the maize with a long stone, not unlike a rolling-pin, which is held at each end, and so moved that it crushes the grain to paste, and at the same time pushes it down to a bowl placed ready to receive it. This process is gone through once, twice, or more, according to the fineness required; and, where great care is taken, it is passed through a fine sieve. A lump of this paste is then taken, and patted skilfully between the hands until it becomes as thin as a light pancake; and the great art consists in thus flattening it out without breaking the edges. The cake is then laid on a smooth plate of iron or flat earthenware, which is placed over some charcoal or wood embers, and kept at a certain heat; here, first one, and then the other side of the tortilla, receives a toasting, and great care is taken that it should not be at all browned. The grand object in the latter part of the process is to serve up the tortillas hot and hot, as fast as possible, in a clean napkin; and a slow eater who begins his first tortilla, will find twenty or thirty piled in a smoking heap at his elbow, long before he has made any progress with his dinner. The making of torillas is so important an art that, in the houses of respectable people, a woman, called from her office "tortillera," is kept for this express purpose; and it sounds very oddly to the ear of a stranger, during meal-times, to hear the rapid patting and slapping which goes forward in the cooking-place until all demands are satisfied. INFLUENCE OF LIGHT ON THE CROCUS.-There are curious phenomena exhibited in flowers, by the expansion and contraction of their parts of fructification, yielding protec tion from wind and rain, and the dews of the night. The crocus is constantly influenced by atmospheric changes, and may also be acted upon in a similar manner by artificial means. The following results, amongst others, arose out of experiments to which we submitted the yellow crocus in the spring of last year. The flowers having been gathered at night, when their corollas were perfectly closed, were placed at the distance of nearly a yard from two lighted candles, and in a temperature of fifty degrees of Fahrenheit's thermometer. In this situation and warmth they remained two hours, but their petals continued nearly closed. Other flowers were gathered at the same time, and being entirely excluded from light, were submitted to a warmth of ninetyfive degrees; the temperature being very gradually raised from sixty-five. Their continuance during two hours in this situation occasioned but very little change in them. Others were also gathered and placed between two lighted candles, at about four inches from each, and in a temperature of seventy to seventy-five degrees. These flowers, in rather less than an hour, were as fully expanded as in the mid-day sun. CONSOLATION. O, CHILD of grief! why weepest thou? What deep sad sorrow lingers there? Thou mourn'st, perhaps, for some one gone- Yet mourn not, for thou hast above Was it remorse that laid thee low? Has cold unkindness wounded thee? And hope in God, for "God is love." Sweet is the thought-time flies apace- LEAVES OF PLANTS.-The functions of the leaves appear to be a combination of those of the lungs and stomach of animals; they not only modify the food brought to them from the roots, so as to fit it for increasing the size of the |