Because the smoke injures the porous structure of the leaves, and interferes with their free respiration.
CHAPTER LXI.
1189. Why are vegetable productions so widely diffused?
Because they everywhere form the food of the animal creation. Without them, neither man nor beast could exist. Even the flesh-eating animals are sustained by them, since they live by preying upon the bodies of vegetable-eaters.
They also enrich and beautify the earth. They present the most charming diversities of proportions and features. From the cowslip, the primrose, and the blue-bell of our childish days, to the broad oak under which we recline, while children gambol round us, they are all beautiful or sublime, and eminently useful in countless ways to man.
They spread a carpet over the surface of the earth; they cling to old ruins, and cover hard rocks, as though they would hide decay, and give warmth to the coldness of stone. In tropical climates they supply rich fruits full of cool and refreshing juices, and they spread out upon the crests of tall trees those broad leaves which shelter the native from the scorching heat of the sun.
They supply our dwellings with furniture of every kind, from the plain deal table, to the handsome cabinet of satin or rose-wood; they afford rich perfumes to the toilette, and luscious fruits and wines to the desert; they charm the eye of the child in the daisied field; they adorn the brow of the bride; they are laid in the coffin with the dead; and, as the cypress or the willow bend over our graves, they become the emblems of our grief.
"The glory of the Lord shall endure for ever: the Lord shall rejoice in his works."—Psalm civ.