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Show [ 28 ] -Scorning the fordid foil, aloft ilie fprings, 259 Shakes her white plume, and claps her golden wings; High o'er the fields of bo.undlefs ether roves, And feeks amid the clouds her foaring loves ! Stretch' d on her moffy couch, in tracklefs deeps, Queen of the coral groves, ZosTERA £leeps ; The :lilvery fea-weed matted round her bed, And di:fl:ant furges murmuring o'er her head.- for bird-lime; and when_ they fall, adhere to the branches of the tree, on which the plant grows, and il:rike root into its bark; or are carried to dil1ant trees by birds. The Tillandfia, or wild·pine, grows on other trees, like the Mifletoe, but takes little or no nouri!hment from them, having large buckets in its leaves to collect and retain the rain -water. See note on Dypfacus. The moffes, which grow on the bark of trees, take much nouri!hment from them; hence it is obferved that trees, which are annually cleared from roofs by a bru!h, grow nearly twice as f~/1. (Phil. Tranfact.) In the cycler countries the peafants bru!h their apple-trees annually. Zojlera. 1. 2.64. Grafs-wrack. Clafs, Feminine Males. Order, many Males. It grows at the bottom of the fea, and rifing to the furface when in flower, covers many leagues ; and is driven at length to the fhore. During its time of floating on the fea, numberlcfs anim:~l s live on the under furface of it; :~nd being fpecifically lighter than the fca-water, or being repelled by it, have kgs placed as it were on their backs for the purpofc of walking under it. As the Scylloea. See Barbut's Genera V crmium. It feerns neccffary that the m:miagcs of plants fhoultl be celebrated in the open air, either becaufe the powder of the anther, or the mucilage on tl e fiigma, or the refervoir of honey might receive injury from the water. Mr. Needham obferved, that in the ripe dufl: of every flower, examined by the microfcope, fome veficles are perceived, from which [ 29 ] High in the Rood her azure dome afcends, The cryfial arch on cryfl:al columns bends ; Roof' d with tran£lucent !hell the turrets blaze, And far in ocean dart ~heir colour' d rays ; 0' er the white floor fucceffive ihadows move, As rife and break the ruffled waves above.Around the nymph her mermaid-trains repair, And weave with orient pearl her radiant hair ; With rapid fins ihe cleaves the watery way, Shoots like a :lilver 1neteor up to day; Sounds a loud conch, convokes a fcaly band, Her fea-born lovers, and afcends the firand. E'en round the pole the Rames of Love afpire, 275 And icy bofoms feel the Jecret :fire!- 2 8o a fluid had efc:~ped ; and that thofe, which flill retain it, explode if they be wetted, like an eolooile fuddenly expofed to a {hong heat. Thefe obfervations have been verified by Spallan.zani and others. Hence rainy feafons make a fcarcity of grain, or hinder its fecundity, by burfling the pollen before it arrives at the moifl: fl:igma of the ~owe~. Spallanzani's Differtations, v. II. p. 321. Thus the flowers of the male Val!If?ena are produced under water, and when ripe detach themfelves from the plant, and nfing to the furface are wafted by the air to the female flowers; See Vallifneria. |