called by the natives of India, Burram chandali. No sooner do its young leaves shoot out of the ground than they begin moving up and down; now with sudden jerks, now with a gentle waving motion. By day or night, in sun or shower, the plant is never at rest; and if the beholder grasp it with his hand, and compel it to be still for a moment, it is no sooner released than it recommences its action with more rapidity than before, as if trying to regain the time it had lost while under pressure. The leaves are composed of three leaflets. Sometimes one leaflet will wave up and down while the others are motionless, and sometimes the three leaflets move simultaneously; but it has been observed that the whole plant is seldom agitated at one time. This flower is a universal wonder, no botanist being able to account for its voluntary movement. The well-known irritability of the sensitive plant, the Venus's fly-trap, the sun dew, and others, is caused by the touch, and is considered by botanists as similar to the action of muscular animal fibre, under the influence of galvanism. But this plant needs no approach of external objects to impel its action, nor is it influenced by electricity in the air, or by any perceptible cause. In our hothouses, the plant loses some of its acting power, and has only a faint tremulous motion. It is also, in India, sometimes nearly quiet during the middle of the day, but its agitation is, in its own climate, generally as unceasing as that of the heaving ocean, or the beating heart. The singular movement of this plant, and the others just referred to, has often been adduced in support of the theory, that vegetables are endowed with sensation. Wordsworth has said, "It is my faith that every flower In modern times, this belief seems almost left to the poet; but a few years since, it was held by the philosopher. We can now scarcely walk a step from the paved ways of the city, without seeing the small reddish-white blossoms of the knotgrass, (Polygonum aviculare.) This little plant is as familiar to our view, as the meadow grass. Forming green patches by every wayside, on the borders of the public highway; shooting up under the walls of the crowded city, or even between the stones of the street. Commoner than even that common flower, the daisy; yet it is scarcely known by name, to any but the botanist. Milton speaks of it, as "The knotgrass dew besprent;" and George Herbert, in giving his advice to the country parson, on the choice of wholesome and medicinal herbs, enumerates this. Notwithstanding its former repute, no "simpler" of modern times would gather it; and the lover of wild flowers often treads over it daily, without any regard. This plant, though called grass, has little more affinity to the true grasses, than that elegant white flower, which, from its beauty, has been termed the grass of Parnassus. Several plants have been called grass; but the true grasses have characteristic marks, which, when once known, are obvious even to those unacquainted with botany. They have all long slender leaves, hollow-jointed stems, and green flowers. Swine are so fond of the knotgrass, that it is, in some counties, commonly called swine's-cress, or hog-weed; and the plant strewed so abundantly over our land, forms, by its seeds and young buds, a good store for the birds. From Milton's lines we may suppose it to be a pleasant food for sheep, as he speaks of the evening, when, "The chewing flocks, Had ta'en their supper of that savoury herb, Several of the true grasses flower during May, though the greater number are not decked with their green and purple panicles, or their silvery pyramids, till the later months. Among the early blooming grasses, we may mention the common foxtail-grass, (Alopecurus pratensis,) which grows on almost every spot of pasture; and is a very useful grass for cattle, blooming twice in the year; and being ripe for the scythe even as early as this month. Its long yellowgreenish blooms are covered with silvery hairs. The bulbous meadow grass, (Poa bulbosa,) and the annual meadow grass, (Poa annua,) are now commonly in flower; the latter, on all green places, in all countries. We have fourteen species of the poa grass. One common kind, the tallest of our native grasses, the reed meadow grass, (Poa aquatica,) is often six feet high. It has a long creeping root, and grows either by the sides of ditches, or on other moist lands. In the fenny districts of Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire, it is a very valuable plant of pasturage; but when it grows in rivers, its tangling roots and luxuriant growth make it very troublesome, and it soon fills up a river which has not a rapid current. Meadows are, at all seasons, pleasant spots. In the dreariest months of the year, their fainter greenness is agreeable to the eye, which has lately looked but on the cold plain of snow, or the leafless trees. But when May comes, and the grass twinkles in the sunshine; and the daisies open their round eyes by thousands among it; and the buttercups gleam in rich profusion, then is the time fully to enjoy the meadow. These simple flowers give delight to the many "who long in populous cities pent," now wander forth into the fields. would we forget the joy which they afford to children. Children spring up, like the buttercup, everywhere, and are linked by strong ties to almost every human heart; and those who can look back to rural walks of early life, when Nor "Thoughts themselves were birds, and stars, and flowers," are disposed to sympathize with the joy of the little ones, as they gaze on the yellow field. The buttercup is a species of ranunculus. The kind which blooms at this early season, is the bulbous crowfoot, (Ranunculus bulbosus,) and may be distinguished from the other flower The May ing kinds, by its bulbous root. buttercups have not passed away, before the creeping buttercup, (Ranunculus repens,) and the acrid crowfoot, (Ranunculus acris,) make their appearance. These bloom on, till the end of August, and here and there, a few of the latter species may be found under the hedges, till time, with his autumnal scythe, has mowed down every flower, and the stormy winds proclaim the winter. In the hedges which border the field, or afford their shade to the green country lane, the flower which receives its name from this month-the May, or hawthorn, (Cratagus Oxyacantha)—is radiant in beauty. Very rarely is it in bloom by the first of May; though by the first of May of the old style, which is twelve days later, the hedge is often white with its pearly blossoms. A decoction of the fragrant flowers of the May is said to counteract poison. The hawthorn bough was formerly hung over every door of England, on the May morning; and brought in from the woods with May-day rejoicings; and it still, in Athens, on that day, graces every doorway of the classic city. The custom of going on May mornings, at break of day, into the woods, to bring away the boughs and flowers, was much discountenanced by our reformers. They regarded it as the remains of an evil superstition; for it had its origin in the spring rites paid by the heathen to Flora; and they also disapproved of the noisy and profligate revelling with which it was often accompanied. They |