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perhaps , has self-complacency been deceived by its imagined possession , which reminds us of the would-be wise savans of the French academy . Priding themselves on having ascertained the exact nature oi the -crab , they submitted their definition—that "it was a red fish which walked backwards "—to Cuvier , who congratulated them on its correctness , m all but three points-that it was not a fish , nor was it red , nor did it walk backwards ! This-by way of warning to those smitten with Mr . Ue Veres propensity to speculate , probably without his powers : for his ability is greater than ordinary , far more " than enthusiasm being discernible in tlie papers composing his volume , a series of meditative discussions , which might be termed , were they less familiar and more condensed in manner , lissays . Treating of a variety of matters , from a pebble to the moon , Mr . De Vere has M M . VWUIllg ^ - ^* « - * » «** * ^ "J ^** ** . »* - ' »* »<—'• wj — - — ~ i I'll ' 1 taste which he certainl
around the ruins of one of the most magnificent creations of Imperial Rome — the Colosseum—which our tourist may now see familiarised in a manner , because , singularly enough , clad with much of the very same verdure in which his own English garden is arrayed . Even in that city , which is the treasury of historical associations , no spot is more memorable than the Colosseum , from the spirit-stirring scenes of which-it was the arena . Galleries , with now scarcely one stone untouched by decay , once glittered with the pomp of Titus and his courtly train , assembled for the ferocious pastime of the amphitheatre ; there , with the splendid animals of the southern wilds , human captives as lightly esteemed , though even the haughty sons of Israel , strove in mortal contest .
The vegetation of the Colosseum contains , Mr . Deakin tells us , not less than four hundred and twenty species , in which number there are examples of two hundred and fifty-three genera , and illustrations- of sixty-three of the natural order of plants . This vegetation , covering , as it does , the surface of the walls and the -interior of the ruins , extends considerably beyond the space occupied by the actual building . It is thus nurtured in a greater variety of soil than might be imagined * the lower and remaining portions favouring the growth of those plants which " prosper in the shade , " as Bacon says ; the dryness and exposure of more elevated positions that of others .
Together with the wall-flower , the mignionette , the daisy , the larkspur , and the pale anemone of spring , blooms the " red-mouthed rose , the woman of the flowers . " As queen of the parterre , it seems to have been equally prized by the ancients as by ourselves , Herodotus telling us of the sixtyleaved rose , to such perfection had the flower been brought , the flagrant petals of which Homer compares to the fingers of the morning . Useful for decoration and as a parfurne , the rose has also a medicinal quality as a slight tonic- ¦ Equally favoured as a fruit appears to hare been the cherry , imported into Italy by Lucullus . Of the peai the Romans are said to have known about thirth-six . varieties ; while the strawberry , which adorns with its blushing blossom ' s the mountain districts of Italy , seems never to have been more , or perhaps so much ,, prized as by ourselves . .
The ivy , so lavishly adorning with its friendly verdure all ruins , decks also the Colosseum . Cultivation , which has obtained so many ornamental species of this plant , has produced from it one pre-eminently beautiful , which , with its hauling- cluster of golden berries , and dark , sombre , green leayes , may be seen covering luxuriantly the tomb of Csecilia Metella .
scope to display the knowledge , ability , and good y possesses in no inconsiderable degree . He discourses alternately ot the mineral , the animal and the vegetable kingdoms , relative to which he has a rich store of facts , together with abundance of curious and interesting illustrations , mingled occasionally with an incident from his own treasury or that of other travellers ; so that there are few readers who could fail to be both enlightened and amused by his pages . Of the ocean and its life , Mr . De Vere has much to tell us in a charming fashion , of its singular possessions and attributes , also of Nature in her hidden depths and her wondrous agency , though we prefer to glean from liis pleasant converse concerning the floral world . A singular fact in connexion with plants is their migration , the seeds being the organs of locomotion , and possessing for that purpose special qualifications for a long journey through the air . Hence the origin of those rings in the turf which Fancy loves to picture as the enchanted circle of some midsummer night ' s revel ,, is in the first instance the with ddis
presence of a species of fungi which when mature , and filled see , - charges its tiny balls in a circle around , and then dies . A fresh ring is thus formed and so the circle goes on enlarging . In this way , or on the wings of the wind * or of birds , flqwers , shrubs , and trees are transplanted to different localities . Often through this natural process , the most careful attempts at monopoly are frustrated , as when the Dutch , says the histor ian of the Indian Archipelago , wishing to limit the supply of the nutmeg to the amount of their own annual produce / determined to destroy all plants producing " fruit after that kind , " and so felled every tree in the Molucca Islands , where it was indigenous . But it happened that all their endeavours trere baffled by a certain crafty little bird who , determined to enjoy himself in spite of all Dutchmen , continued to feast on the nuts and ' to carry their-seeds to distant pavts wheresoever he would . Even the ocean is subservient to the erratic inclination of plants , the great cocoa-nut in its weathertight coating riding buovantlv fau over the waves . . --B .
A curious . instance among the various uses of plants is their adaptation , to furnish dwellings to so many different classes of occupants . The ant of South America having luxurious habits , takes care to provide himself with alternate residences for the different seasons , at winter resting in the warm ground , and U \ summer making -his abode in the tops of tall plants . His favourite palace is the enormous reed growing on the banks of the Amazon , which thirty feet in height is seen crowned with a large ball of earth like the globe of a steeple—the home of myriads of ants . Safe in the hollow of the reed they there ascend and descend , sheltered from inundation or attack , living on what the surface of the water bears them . Tradition tells us , moreover ,-of a hollow plane-tree wherein twenty-one , guests were feasted ; which is the fig-tree of India . Mr . De Vere tells us ' how the indolent Boirje builds himself a hut and . dream's his life away under the pleasant shade of its spreading branches . Whole nations even have thus their aerial habitations ; for instance , the Guarn . nies , ' west of Orinbco . Taking : the leaf stalks of the Mauritius palm ,
they [ twine them into cords , which they skilfully weave into mats , lhesc they suspend high in the air , and cover with clay for their homes , the fires of which may he seen by the traveller , in the dark night , blazing in the tops of the loftiest forest trees . " We may thus credit the records of men haying been born in trees . Among the inhabitants of the cast coast of Africa , it is common t <> make tombs of the trunks . Ail interesting custom thus obtains with the Indians of Maine , who on the death of one of their lenders , turn up a young rnaple-trei \ place the body of their chief underneath , and then let the roots spring . back , thus erecting a verdant monument to the departed . According to the exquisite providence of nature , trees are indebted notonly to tbe infinite variety of their structures and properties , but even to their barks for preservation find advancement . In mountain trees we- find the barks deeply furrowed with numerous channels , so that an avenue may be afforded for the moisture to reach their roek-emburied roots . The northern
birches nnd willows have their silvery barks , tlmt tlie whiteness-may reflect what little beat is afforded , while m the soxlth the coverings nre dark and soft to resist ir . A story is told to prove the indestructibility of this garment of vegetation . The grave of Nuina Poinpilius wns opened , it is ssxid , four hundred years after liis denth , when the body of the king was found to be a handful of dust , while the frail bark on which his luws were written remained uninjured at his side ! Among his incidents of travel , Mr .-De Vere relates one peculiarly interesting . Visiting the abode of Lihn < 5 , he found among the relies preserved in his house , an ingenious and singular contrivance—n " floral cluck . " In a- half circle , round tbe table of the great botanist , a number of plants : were surnnged , which opening their ( lowers at n certain moment , told the hour with unerring exactitude 1 Hut mnny vyevo the truths told by flowers to Mr . De Vere , who , regarding them with u poet ' s eye , conceives " how siUin they are to human things , " suid pleasantly imparts the lessons to all wlio will attend .
Flora of tlir , Coloitsnim of Rome . Uy Kiehurd IXmUIii , 51 . IX Groomltvulgo niul Bonn . Those who , lovers of florid productions , possess the power of appreciating objects nmonjf the most exquisite in creation , will be interested by Mr . Donkin ' s graceful little volume- Its pages , containing descriptions of a great variety of flowers , plants , tvecs , nhrubs , and grapes , arc brightened also occasionally by coloured illustrations of the more tile-gout of the specimens . Among these boiihj are beautiful , while all are more or less curious , from the vnrioua peculiarities of their nature and proper ties . The chnnn of association , moreover , attaches to them ; they flourish
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TWO " POETS OF THE PEOPLE . " $ The Lump of Gold and other Poems . By Charles Mackay . London : Routledg « and Co . Five years ago , we recorded in the columns of this journal our opinion _ that Dr . Vlackay ' V poetry "is rather the reflex of a temperament poetically inclined , than the fervid utterance of a soul burdened with the mysteries of its sensations . " To that opinion we still adhere , and . see no occasion to modify it in any decree . Dr . Mackay is a poet of the people , and exhibits all the excellences " and defects peculiar to poets of that class . He has fancy , generosity of sentiment , and a certain faculty of musical expression ; but he has the invariable " popular " faiilt of givingundue prominence to merely temporary interests : his poems , for the most part , are like versified newspapers , or leading articles beaten into lines and stanzas . Herein , perhaps , consists their peculiar
excellence and their genuine worth ; for they . speak at orice to ' the every-day sympathies of every-day people , and sanctify with something of ideality and noble aspiration—with much of harmonious feeling and expression '—the hard facts and utilitarian progress of the day . Workmen from the loom and the spinning-jenny , from the steam-engine and the printing-office , may find in the poetry of * Mackay an « cho of their daily thoughts and desires , and may be the better for finding those feelings expressed and made clear to them in language which they can understand , yet which surpasses any that they have at their own command . Dr . Mackay ' s object—to vise his own words—is "to sing a music to the march'of man . " We are therefore fully impressed with ' the good results that may accrue from " poetry for the people , " and we must concede toDr . Mackay one of the first places in that particular class . But the poetry , considered in the abstract , cannot "be of the highest kind . Jt is too didactic ; too self-conscious and sectional ; too content with obvious moralities ; too much
subjected to passing forms and modes . The greatest creations of poetry are of equal interest in every age , because they are built upon the broad foundations of our nature ; but poems written j ' or the time will only preserve their interest with the time . There ave of course a few exceptions to this rule , as in some of the verses of Hood and Tennyson , and in the noble " Cry of tolio Factory Children , " of Mrs . Hnrrett Browning ; but such poems , besides the interest arising out of the temporary circumstances to which they refer , appeal to the deepest emotions of humanity . Dr . ' Maekay , like all poets of the people , seems to have great facility in the making of verses . It is not a fatal facility ; for in the volume beforo us , nnd stanzas much tlmt
as in all his volumes , there arc many delightful Hues — is worthy to pass into t ] ie national heart , and which the national heart wi . l be the better for receiving . But we feur he trusts himself too confidently to the tirst thought—surrenders himself too quickly to the tendency ( perhaps habitual to him ) of moulding all his emotions into veisse , of seiting his daily life to music , as Tub id Cain dashed out harmonies from the smiting of his hummer on the anvil . The result in the case of Dr . Muckay is the publication of much eomiaon-plaec prettiness , which really does injustice to the sterling nuitter whieli at other times he can put forth . Why does ho not regard his own reputation more jealously ; weigh every line a hundred times over ; reject the drossand burnish by repealed Inborn- the line metal ?
, " The " Lump of Gold" is a story , showing how the heir of » noble l > ut ruined house left lua young wife , the daughter of a country clergyman , to seek a renewal of his fortunes in tho gold fields of Australia ; how he nearly murdered a friend and fellow digger ; how he fled back to England , under the impression that he wus a homicide j lived a wretched , raving life in London for n long time ; then returned to the village where his wife resided , and was comforted l > y the ghostly consolation of his reverend f « ther-in-lavr , mid still more by the discovery that tho gentleman to whom he lmd given s
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January 26 , ISoo . ] THE LEADER . 9 l
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 26, 1856, page 91, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2125/page/19/
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