, of Utah, the zinc
mingled with the silver ore is betrayed by the abundance of the zinc
violet, a delicate and beautiful cousin of the pansy. In Germany this
little flower is admittedly a signal of zinc in the earth, and zinc is
found in its juices. The late Mr. William Dorn, of South Carolina, had
faith in a bush, of unrecorded name, as betokening gold-bearing veins
beneath it. That his faith was not without foundation is proved by the
large fortune he won as a gold miner in the Blue Ridge country--his
guide the bush aforesaid. Mr. Rossiter W. Raymond, the eminent mining
engineer of New York, has given some attention to this matter of
"indicative plants." He is of the opinion that its unwritten lore among
practical miners, prospectors, hunters, and Indians is well worth
sifting. Their observations, often faulty, may occasionally be sound and
valuable enough richly to repay the trouble of separating truth from
error. When we see how important as signs of water many plants can be,
why may we not find other plants denoting the minerals which they
especially relish as food or condiment?

Of more account than gold or silver are the harvests of wheat and corn
that ripen in our fields. There the special appetites of plants have
much more than merely curious interest for the farmer. He knows full
well that his land is but a larder which serves him best when not part
but all its stores are in demand. Hence his crop "rotation," his
succession of wheat to clover, of grass to both. Were he to grow barley
every year he would soon find his soil bared of all the food that barley
asks, while fare for peas or clover stood scarcely broached. If he
insists on planting barley always, then he must perforce restore to the
land the food for barley constantly withdrawn.

[Illustration: Maple Seed, with pair of wings]

A plant may diligently find food and drink, pour forth delicious nectar,
array itself with flowers as gayly as it can, and still behold its work
unfinished. Its seed may be produced in plenty, and although as far as
that goes it is well, it is not enough. Of what avail is all this seed
if it falls as it ripens upon soil already overcrowded with its kind?
Hence the vigorous emigration policy to be observed in plants of every
name. Hence the fluffy sails set to catch the passing breeze by the
dandelion, the thistle and by many more, including the southern plant of
snowy wealth whose wings are cotton. With the same intent of see