[247] Fauna Antiqua Sivalensis. Being the Fossil Zoology of the Sewalik Hills in the North of India: by Hugh Falconer and Proby T. Cautley. 1844.
CHAPTER XIV.
PHENOMENA OF VEGETABLE LIFE.
Psychology of Flowers—Progress of Matter towards Organization—Vital Force—Spontaneous Generation—The Vegetable Cell—Simplest Development of Organization—The Crystal and the Cell—Primitive Germ—Progress of Vegetation—Influence of Light—Morphology—Germination—Production of Woody Fibre—Leaves—Chlorophylle—Decomposition of Carbonic Acid—Influence of Light, Heat, and Actinism on the Phenomena of Vegetable Life—Flowers and Fruits—Etiolation—Changes in the Sun’s Rays with the Seasons—Distribution of Plants—Electrical and Combined Physical Powers
The variety of beautiful forms which cover the surface of this sphere, serve, beyond the physical purposes to which we have already alluded, to influence the mind, and give character to the inhabitants of every locality. There are men who appear to be dead to the mild influences of flowers; but these sweet blossoms—the stars of our earth—exert a power as diffusive as their pervading odours.
The poet tells us of a man to whom
The primrose on the river’s brim
A yellow primrose was to him,