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Whole Floras, all Linnaeus' and Buffon's volumes, are dry catalogues of facts; but the most trivial of these facts, the habit of a plant, the organs, or work, or noise of an insect, applied to the illustration of a fact in intellectual philosophy, or, in any way associated to human nature, affects us in the most lively and agreeable manner.
In the southern hemisphere, if we compare large tracts of land in Australia, South Africa, and western South America, between latitudes 25 deg and 35 deg, we shall find parts extremely similar in all their conditions, yet it would not be possible to point out three faunas and floras more utterly dissimilar.
Instead of the life of Christ, men had, for the most part, to paint the lives of Bacchus and Venus; and if you walk through any public gallery of pictures by the "great masters," as they are called, you will indeed find here and there what is called a Holy Family, painted for the sake of drawing pretty children, or a pretty woman; but for the most part you will find nothing but Floras, Pomonas, Satyrs, Graces, Bacchanals, and Banditti.
With what gracious condescension does he acknowledge the half-timid, half-daring smiles of all the little caramel-chewing Floras and Faunas who have made it a point to be on Main Street at this hour! With what careless grace does he doff his laurel wreath, which is of the latest and most modish fall block, with the bow at the back, in response to the waved greeting of Mrs.
And this moorland soil, and this vegetation, with a few singular exceptions, repeats itself, as I daresay you know, in the north of the county, in the Bagshot basin, as it is called the moors of Aldershot, Hartford Bridge, and Windsor Forest. Now what a variety of interesting questions are opened up by these simple facts. How did these three floras get each to its present place?
Among these I am myself quite pleased with my chapters on New Zealand, as I believe I have fully explained and accounted for all the main peculiarities of the New Zealand and Australian floras. I call the book "Island Life," etc. etc., and I think it will be interesting. Thanks for your regrets and kind wishes anent Epping.
These are nearly the extreme views, but they are the views of two most capable and most experienced judges, in respect to one of the best-known floras of the world. The fact is suggestive, that the best-known countries furnish the greatest number of such doubtful cases.
I would say to Robertson what an old tutor of a college said to one of his pupils, 'Read over your compositions, and whenever you meet with a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out! Goldsmith's abridgment is better than that of Lucius Floras or Eutropius; and I will venture to say, that if you compare him with Vertot in the same places of the Roman History, you will find that he excels Vertot.
When Floras tried to prove that under Hadrian's rule Rome had risen to the highest stage of its manhood, his friend, Demetrius, of Alexandria, interrupted him, and begged him to tell him something about the Emperor's person. Florus willingly acceded to this request, and sketched a brilliant picture of the administrative talent, the learning, and the capability of the Emperor.
They wandered through moss walks and alleys, through tangled shrubberies bursting into bloom, beneath avenues of blossoming horse-chestnuts and scented limes, between thickets of budding red and white may, and jungles of neglected rhododendrons; through sunken gardens and walled ones, past terraces with broken balustrades of stone, and fallen Floras and Dianas, past moss-grown fountains splashing in lovely corners.
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