Style (botany)

“ We turn from this realm of idealistic philosophy and imagination, from rejuvenescence, the wave-pulse of metamorphosis, the spiral tendency of growth, and the individuality of plants, to the last chapter of our history of systematic botany and morphology, where there is less dogmatism and less poetry, but a firmer ground on which will spring an unexpected wealth of new discoveries and of deeper insight into the nature of the vegetable world. ”

“ Yet we may add, the botanist himself is no vandal, but his humble labors do contribute to the onward march of civilization. The humblest flower or coarsest weed may contain lessons of wisdom the most profound, and botany is particularly adapted to combine science and culture. ”

“ From the very beginning of its existence, the study of plants has been approached from two widely separated standpoints—the philosophical and the utilitarian. Regarded from the first point of view, Botany stands on its own merits, as an integral branch of natural philosophy, whereas, from the second, it is merely a by-product of medicine or agriculture. ”

“ But to us, as artists, or lovers of art, this is the first and most vital question concerning a plant: “Has it a fixed form or a changing one? Shall I find it always as I do to-day—this Parnassia palustris—with one leaf and one flower? or may it some day have incalculable pomp of leaves and unmeasured treasure of flowers? Will it rise only to the height of a man—as an ear of corn—and perish like a man; or will it spread its boughs to the sea and branches to the river, and enlarge its circle of shade in heaven for a thousand years?” ”

“ In his works, he rises above mere technical description of the species with which he is dealing. His mind is filled with the beauty and wonder of plants; and he strives to impress the reader with the deep interest of the study of botany. ”

“ In botany, an extensive and important natural order of exogenous trees and shrubs, found exclusively in the temperate and tropical parts of the Old World, and unknown in a wild state in America. The fruit is pulpy, succulent, sub-acid, and eatable, and separated into cells by membranous partitions, and is covered with a leathery aromatic skin or rind. Some of the genera embrace plants of great beauty and utility. A few of the Indian species are climbers. The genus CIT′RUS, which includes the orange, lemon, citron, lime, bergamot, and shaddock, is that best known in Europe. ”

“ The formation of an exact and extensive descriptive language for botany has been executed with a degree of skill and felicity, which, before it was attained, could hardly have been dreamt of as attainable. Every part of a plant has been named ”

“ Few readers may care to sympathise with the distress of a naturalist who looks on his specimens, not only as scientific documents bringing some additions to our knowledge of the structure and relations of the organised world, but as things of beauty giving delight to the senses of form and colour, when, after much pains and care, he finds the flowers change their hues and drop off, the leaves turn black, and when mould, the sure sign of decomposition, begins to encrust the stems and fruits. ”

“ Then the stem contracts to ordinary dimensions, and leaf and blossom expand into things which may well be a joy to the botanist’s eye. A thousand times during that shady saunter did I envy my companions their scientific acquaintance with the beautiful green things of earth, and that intimate knowledge of a subject which enhances one’s appreciation of its charms as much as bringing a lamp into a darkened picture-gallery. There are the treasures of form and color, but from ignorant eyes more than half their charms and wonders are held back. ”

“ Woodcuts are added to supply any defects in the description, and to give a clear idea of the plant intended by the name; and these figures, which always give the whole plant and were drawn immediately from nature by the hands of practised artists, are so true to nature that a botanist's eye at once recognises in every case the object meant to be represented. ”

“ Botany is the name of the science of the vegetable kingdom in general; that is, of plants. ”

“ The types that lay latent in the oldest vegetation have simply been separated and perfected; progressive development has been gradually led along a series of intricate but constantly diverging lines that lead out and up, and finally terminate in the endless graded ranks and profuse varieties which constitute the grand flora—the grandest the world has ever seen—that annually buds and blooms, and bears its wealth of leaf and fruit for you and me, provided only we appreciate it all. ”

“ Were it only for the peculiarly rich odor of the flowers, it deserves a place in every garden, but when we combine this with the evergreen and neat habit of the plant, and the exquisite beauty of the flower, it seems strange as the cultivation is so easy, that it is not more generally seen, even what is grown are mostly varieties of no pretension to perfection, but simply a step or two removed from the natural state. ”

“ If you are a lover of nature many objects will attract your attention, and beguile your moments, as you ascend higher and higher. Do you take a pleasure in Botany? There are the p. 36shrub, bush, diversified flowers, and rare plants, emitting a reviving fragrance ”

“ Flowers are the most exquisitely delicate in their texture of all forms in the vegetable kingdom. Look at the petals of this one. Could anything be softer or finer? The leaf, the bark, and the wood of the plant are all coarse, in comparison to the flower. Now, as nothing is made in vain, there must be some reason for this. The leaves and bark, as well as wood, of plants, all have vessels through which sap flows, and this sap nourishes, sustains, and builds up the plant, as our blood does our bodies. But the whole effort of the plant is to reproduce itself ”

“ Its large leaves, of a rich polished green, arrange themselves symmetrically around the short stem, seeming to come from the ground—and so fine are they, that if no blossom appeared, we should feel the plant had fulfilled its mission of beauty. ”

“ The more highly they have been developed, oftentimes the greater their beauty, the less able are they to see to it that the chief function of flowers is accomplished. Such garden plants are increased by root division, cuttings and other arts of the gardener. ”

“ It is to be regretted that this is the case, for assuredly there is nothing in cultivation more calculated to improve the aspect of things therein. Not showy in mass of flower, like many things common enough now, it is of the highest order of beauty; while the drooping habit of the shoots of most kinds gives the plant a grace which is valuable indeed, and which no flower-garden should be without. ”

“ From the numerous magenta flowers strange, yellowish, cup-shaped fruits develop, seeming to spring one out of the other in a haphazard way, hanging in long chains, awkward but rather ornamental, and remaining on the plants for several years without change, except that they grow slightly larger. The distant effect of this plant is a pale, fuzzy mass, attractive in color, giving no hint of its treacherous character—more like a wild beast than a plant! ”

“ A striking plant, though dull in color, from one to one and a half feet tall, with a rough, rather slanting stem, dull green, roughish, rather leathery leaves, and clusters of slightly sweet-scented, queer-looking flowers, each over half an inch across, with greenish-yellow petals, the hoods white inside and maroon outside, their tips curved in, a green stigma and brown anthers. ”

“ In addition to many plants in seed, or which, from their foliage, were worthy of introduction into art-work, no less than seventy-four were met with in flower; many of these, as the dog-rose, blackberry, white bryony, comfrey, mallow, hawthorn, and silver-weed, being excellent for carving; while the bladder campion, forget-me-not, meadow cranesbill, ground-ivy, meadow vetchling, cinquefoil, oxalis, and honeysuckle, would be valuable for lighter work—muslins, papers, or lace. We cannot doubt that the interest thus evolved from a direct study of nature would be a growing one ”

“ In the kingdom of the plant and vegetable, distinct and variegated hues exist but the fruit and flowers are not in conflict for that reason. Nay, rather, the very fact that there is difference and variety lends a charm to the garden. If all were of the same color the effect would be monotonous and depressing. When you enter a rose-garden the wealth of color and variety of floral forms spread before you a picture of wonder and beauty. ”

“ He looks at her flower, not with the enlarging lens, that he may gather facts for the botanist, but with the light of the one who sees in her choice selection of brilliant tones and delicate tints, suggestions of future harmonies. ”

“ When the roots are luxuriantly prolific, the flowers are in some measure defective, Nature, relaxing as it were from her usual solicitude, and allowing her children to repose, and indulge in the abundance of good things about them. ”

“ Those forms which appear to be necessary to its health, the symmetry of its leaflets, the smoothness of its stalks, the vivid green of its shoots, are looked upon by us as signs of the plant's own happiness and perfection; they are useless to us, except as they give us [Page 93] pleasure in our sympathizing with that of the plant, and if we see a leaf withered or shrunk or worm-eaten, we say it is ugly, and feel it to be most painful, not because it hurts us, but because it seems to hurt the plant, and conveys to us an idea of pain and disease and failure of life in it. ”

“ It is, without doubt, one of the finest of the species, and when well grown forms a noble plant, its long spikes of attractive flowers, in company with its bold and characteristic foliage and its majestic habit of growth, imparting to it an aspect of dignity which no one can fail to recognise. ”

“ One Genus of this Plant is sometimes of a shrubby Nature; for new, short, and small Branches springing up every Year, remain firm and green for some Years, and rise above the Earth, till by their own Weight they bend downwards, hide themselves in the Ground, and sometimes send out fibrous Roots. ”

“ When all this is done, the flower, in most instances, becomes 'monstrous' of the eyes in the botanist, though all the more interesting to the student of morphology on that account. In like manner the double flowers, the "breaks," the "sports" which the florist cultivates so anxiously, are all of them greater or less deviations from the ordinary form, while the broccolies, the cabbages, and many other products of our kitchen gardens and fields owe the estimation in which they are held entirely to those peculiarities which, by an unhappy application of words, are called monstrous by botanists. ”

“ In the effort to promote the knowledge of plants for practical purposes by careful description of individual forms, the impression forced itself on the mind of the observer, that there are various natural groups of plants which have a distinct resemblance to one another in form and in other characteristics. ”

“ The roots grow thick, great and deep, spreading much, and enduring long, of a brownish colour on the outside, and whitish within. The whole plant and every part of it smelling strong, and aromatically, and is of a hot, sharp, biting taste. ”

“ But even when the flower or plant is something better than a “touch” of colour, there is often some gross carelessness, or ignorance, which gives a sense of annoyance rather than of pleasure. Each returning year, the Gardeners’ Chronicle reviews the Royal Academy from a botanical point of view, and nothing can be droller than the blunders it points out. Sometimes all sorts of flowers of various seasons are growing together, or a wood, through which a knight is riding, is adorned with agarics and fungi that belong to different periods of the year. ”

“ Plants, when taken from the places whence they derive their extraction, and planted in others of different qualities, betray such fondness for their native earth, that with great difficulty they are brought to thrive in another; and in this it is that the florist's art consists; for to humour each plant with the soil, the sun, the shade, the degrees of dryness or moisture, and the neighbourhood it delights in, (for there is a natural antipathy between some plants, insomuch that they will not thrive near one another) are things not easily attainable, but by a length of study and application. ”

“ Subtropical gardening has shown us that one of the greatest mistakes ever made in the flower-garden was the adoption of a few varieties of plants for culture on a vast scale, to the exclusion of interest and variety, and, too often, of beauty or taste. ”

“ This representative flower will always be a wild one, and of the simplest form which completely expresses the character of the plant; existing divinely and unchangeably from age to age, ungrieved by man's neglect, and inflexible by his power. ”

“ In such situations the plant grows with luxuriance, and from the large size and brilliant yellow of its star-like flowers, the vigorous growth of the rich green foliage, and the long succulent stems, it becomes a striking feature even in the mass of bold healthy vegetation so commonly found by the edges of a water-course: these, therefore, are the characters which, in embodying the plant in any design, we must endeavour to enforce. ”

“ Thus the humblest flower of the field, although, to one whose curiosity has not been excited, and whose understanding has, therefore, remained uninformed, it may appear worthless and contemptible, is valuable to the botanist, not only with regard to its place in the arrangement of this portion of the Creator’s works, but as it leads his mind forward to the consideration of those beautiful provisions for the support of vegetable life, which it is the part of the physiologist to study and admire [128] .
[128] “Insect Architecture,” vol. i. p. 9. London: Charles Knight & Co., Ludgate St. ”