from those which truly resist the toil of men, and conspire against their fame; which are cunning to consume, and
prolific to encumber; and of whose perverse and unwelcome sowing we know, and can say assuredly, "An enemy hath done this."
10. Again. The character of strength which gives prevalence over others to any common plant, is more or less consistently dependent on woody fibre in the leaves; giving them strong ribs and great expanding extent; or spinous edges, and wrinkled or gathered extent.
Get clearly into your mind the nature of those two conditions. When a leaf is to be spread wide, like the Burdock, it is supported by a framework of extending ribs like a Gothic roof. The supporting function of these is geometrical; every one is constructed like the girders of a bridge, or beams of a floor, with all manner of science in the distribution of their substance in the section, for narrow and deep strength; and the shafts are mostly hollow. But when the extending space of a leaf is to be enriched with fulness of folds, and become beautiful in wrinkles, this may be done either by pure undulation as of a liquid current along the leaf edge, or by sharp 'drawing'—or 'gathering' I believe ladies would call it—and stitching of the edges together. And this stitching together, if to be done very strongly, is done round a bit of stick, as a sail is reefed round a mast; and this bit of stick needs to be compactly, not geometrically strong; its function is essentially that of starch,—not to hold the leaf up off the ground against gravity; but to stick the edges out, stiffly, in a crimped frill. And in beautiful work of
this kind, which we are meant to study, the stays of the leaf—or stay-bones—are finished off very sharply and exquisitely at the points; and indeed so much so, that they prick our fingers when we touch them; for they are not at all meant to be touched, but admired.
11. To be admired,—with qualification, indeed, always, but with extreme respect for their endurance and orderliness. Among flowers that pass away, and leaves that shake as with ague, or shrink like bad cloth,—these, in their sturdy growth and enduring life, we are bound to honour; and, under the green holly, remember how much softer friendship was failing, and how much of other loving, folly. And yet—you are not to confuse the thistle with the cedar that is in Lebanon; nor to forget—if the spinous nature of it become too cruel to provoke and offend—the parable of Joash to Amaziah, and its fulfilment: "There passed by a wild beast that was in Lebanon, and trode down the thistle."
12. Then, lastly, if this rudeness and insensitiveness of nature be gifted with no redeeming beauty; if the boss of the thistle lose its purple, and the star of the Lion's tooth, its light; and, much more, if service be perverted as beauty is lost, and the honied tube, and medicinal leaf, change into mere swollen emptiness, and salt brown membrane, swayed in nerveless languor by the idle sea,—at last the separation between the two natures is as great as between the fruitful earth and fruitless ocean; and between the living hands that tend the Garden of Herbs where
Love is, and those unclasped, that toss with tangle and with shells.
13. I had a long bit in my head, that I wanted to write, about St. George of the Seaweed, but I've no time to do it; and those few words of Tennyson's are enough, if one thinks of them: only I see, in correcting press, that I've partly misapplied the idea of 'gathering' in the leaf edge. It would be more accurate to say it was gathered at the central rib; but there is nothing in needlework that will represent the actual excess by lateral growth at the edge, giving three or four inches of edge for one of centre. But the stiffening of the fold by the thorn which holds it out is very like the action of a ship's spars on its sails; and absolutely in many cases like that of the spines in a fish's fin, passing into the various conditions of serpentine and dracontic crest, connected with all the terrors and adversities of nature; not to be dealt with in a chapter on weeds.