Of this kind is the myrtle of Louisiana, scientifically called Cerefera angustifolia, and another species, with broad leaves, which grows in Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and Virginia. These yield their wax from the berries, this substance surrounding a small stone in the centre of the fruit. When made into candles, this wax produces a clear white flame, affording a grateful light, while it emits an agreeable and healthful fragrance.

It were easy, would our plan permit, to multiply instances in which a bountiful Providence has bestowed on trees, those most magnificent productions of the vegetable world,—qualities in various other ways useful to man. But as I must not enlarge, I shall conclude this section of the work with a single observation. It has already been remarked, that there are in various departments of nature, principles and qualities which seem to be lying waste, or which are, at all events, but partially employed, and which it only requires the judicious labour of man to call forth in abundance. In noticing this fact, I took occasion to state, that these resources lead us to look forward to a period in which the improvements introduced by genius and industry, will people the earth to a far greater extent than has yet been realized. A similar view may be taken of the vegetable powers which we have just been considering. The productions in question exist in a much greater profusion, than the wants of man in his present condition require; but the time may come when all their qualities shall be called into action, and shall contribute to the prosperity and comfort of a vastly increased population. The croton and piney trees may yet be eagerly sought after and extensively cultivated, for the sake of their tallow, and other properties; and the wax-palm of the lofty Andes, carefully reared in its own locality, or transplanted to our northern climes, may yet furnish its peculiar produce, to add to the resources of the arts, at a period when the dense population of an enlightened and industrious community, shall have found that the

present means by which its use is superseded, shall have become too scanty for the supply of their incalculably augmented demands. The philosopher, as well as the man of piety, must therefore come to the conclusion, that, to allege that any natural production capable of being turned to use, is superfluous or superabundant, merely because it remains at present unemployed, is quite premature and unwarrantable. He will even go further, and will see in the provision, a prospective contrivance of Creative Wisdom anticipating coming necessities, which opens to his mind the most magnificent prospects.

FOURTH WEEK-SATURDAY.

VEGETABLE LIFE IN THE POLAR REGIONS.

BEFORE leaving the subject of vegetation, it would be improper to omit some account of the state of that department of nature in the polar regions, which, in so many particulars, is remarkably contrasted with the same department under the other extreme of the tropics, and this matter has been so appropriately treated in the "Edinburgh Cabinet Library,' "* that I shall have little more to do than to curtail that interesting account.

The vegetable world does not, in this dark and outer boundary of the earth, possess such an important and commanding character as the animal, which will afterward be noticed. The Creator, without departing wholly from the system and laws he has prescribed to nature, could not clothe with vegetable verdure a soil which, for nine months in the year, is frozen as hard as a rock, and covered with snow many feet deep. The seeds of more genial climates, indeed, when sown during the short and bright summer, spring up, and wear for some time a

*Polar Seas and Regions, pp. 79-86.

promising appearance, but they are all nipt by the untimely winter. Still nature, in the northern regions, approaching the Arctic Zone, does employ resources suited to the peculiar circumstances of the climate.

The fir, the pine, and other trees of these regions, on being pierced, distil, not the balmy and fragrant gums of Arabia and India, but rich, thick, coarse juices, by which their interior heat has been preserved, and which, when prepared as pitch, tar, and turpentine, serve many valuable purposes of commerce. Through the cherishing influences of these juices, the lakes of North America are bordered with tall dark forests, which afford to more favoured countries, an inexhaustible supply of valuable timber. Even their gloomy foliage, while the forests of the south are every autumn strewing the ground with their faded leaves, brave through the winter all the fury of the northern tempest. But, before reaching the inclement sky of the Arctic Circle, this magnificent growth decays. Trees, which in a more southerly region, are the pride of the forest, dwindle into meagre and stunted shrubs. Beyond this circle, these monarchs of the wood, if they appear, rise only to the height of a few feet, throwing out lateral branches. On Melville Peninsula, dwarf willow, and the Andromeda tetragona, almost alone afford to the Esquimaux a scanty supply of wood for their arms and utensils. Considerable quantities of drift timber are, however, frequently found along the barren shores of the Arctic Regions, supposed to have floated from the mouths of the Siberian and other northern rivers.

The plants which abound most in these dreary climates, belong to the tribes of mosses and lichens, the cryptogamia of Linnæus, the acotyledones of Jussieu. The meagre vegetation with which the arctic surface is covered, thus appears rather as if it were the produce of the rocks than of the soil. Yet the moss and lichen, which form the prevailing features, are not only copiously produced, but possess a nutritious and salutary

quality, not displayed in more fortunate regions. One species of lichen (L. rangeferinus), forms, as it were, the main staff of life to the Laplander. It supports the reindeer, and the rein-deer supports him. The lichen of Iceland, boiled in soup, or even converted into bread, is to the natives a substantial part of their subsistence. Farther north, where the depth of the snow, and the continuance of frost, drive the inhabitants to the shore and to animal food, these vegetables still afford support to the deer, and to the other quadrupeds, which they use as aliment. It is even with a species of moss that they trim their lamps. The fungus, or mushroom, which draws nourishment without the aid of a proper root, and the filices, or ferns, which consist only of one spreading leaf, the middle rib of which forms all their stalk, while their slender roots spread under the ground,—these find the means of existence even in Greenland.

The fucus tribes, comprehending nearly all the variety of marine botany, grow in vast abundance on the northern shores. These rude plants, which have little or no distinction of stem, root, or leaves, and whose fructification is often included within the substance of the frond, cover the Greenland coast with submarine meadows. The confervæ, too, with their numerous filaments, spring up in profusion.

A few plants, not belonging to this imperfect order of vegetation, embellish, during the short summer gleam, the northern fields. Under the bright influence of the sun at this season, indeed, some of the most beautiful among the floral tribe expand their petals. The ranunculus and anemone display their rich and varied tints; several species of saxifrage flourish; and the yellow poppy has even a gaudy appearance, so that the poppy genus, which enriches the plains of Hindostan, is among the last to expire under the snows of the pole.

The nobler fruits do not ripen under this ungenial sky; yet shrubs, producing delicious berries, appear on the borders, at least, of the arctic zone, in great profu

sion. The northern Indians consider the fruit of a bush, called aronia ovalis, as the most agreeable food; besides which, they have the strawberry, the raspberry, the red whortleberry, and various others. Some of these are covered beneath the first snows of winter, which are supposed to mellow them, and which, when dissolved by spring, show the berries still hanging on the branches, thus furnishing an early supply of grateful food, while the buds of all the others are bursting,— the whole producing a delightful impression, unknown to those who have not witnessed the desolation which immediately preceded.

These bleak regions enjoy a precious boon in the plants which act as an antidote to scurvy, and which defy the most severe cold of the arctic zone. The cochlearia, a thick-tufted juicy plant, of extreme fecundity, is emphatically called scurvy-grass; and different species of sorrel were found by Captain Parry flourishing under the snow, at the very farthest limit of vegetation.

Among the other phenomena of the arctic regions, may be mentioned that singular production which astonished the northern voyagers by the appearance of red snow. This phenomenon has been supposed by naturalists to be occasioned by an assemblage of very minute vegetable bodies, belonging to the class of cryptogamic plants, and the natural order algo.* This plant, if it be a plant, seems to be by no means peculiar to the

* A very different account has lately been given of the origin of red snow, which, if corroborated, will prove that the colouring matter is not a vegetable substance at all, but the excrement of a bird. Mr Nicholson, who made an expedition to Regent's Bay in 1821, states, that he there observed crimson snow, and that it was evident, at first view, that the colouring matter lay on the surface. "This substance," says he, "lay scattered here and there in small masses, bearing some resemblance to powdered cochineal, surrounded by a lighter shade, which was produced by the colouring matter being partly dissolved and diffused by the deliquescent snow. During this examination, our hats and upper garments were observed to be daubed with a substance of a similar red colour, and a moment's reflection convinced us that this was the excrement of the little awk, myriads of which were continually flying over our heads, having their nests among the loose