“Nevertheless, there are uninhabited countries which are gorged with vegetation—­the territory we are in, for example.”

“True; but still no plant has ever sprung up anywhere without a seed has been planted, either by the will of God or by the hands of man.  With regard, however, to the distribution of vegetation in a natural state, that depends more upon the soil and climate than anything else; wherever there is a fertile soil and moist air, there seeds will find their way.”

“But how?”

“The seeds of a great many plants are furnished with downy filaments, which act as wings; these are taken up by the wind and carried immense distances; others are inclosed in an elastic shell, from which, when ripe, they are ejected with considerable force.”

“The propagation of plants that have wings or elastic shells may, in that way, be accounted for; but there are some seeds that fall, by their own weight, exactly at the foot of the vegetable kingdom that produces them.”

“It is often these that make the longest voyages.”

“By what conveyance, then?”

“Well, my son, for a philosopher, I cannot say that your knowledge is very profound; seeds that have no wings borrow them.”

“Not from the ant, I presume?”

“No, not exactly; but from the quail, the woodcock, the swallow, and a thousand others, that are apparently more generous than the poor ant, to which AEsop has given a reputation for avarice that it will have some trouble to shake off.  The birds swallow the seeds, many of which are covered with a hard, horny skin, that often resists digestion; these are carried by the inhabitants of the air across rivers, seas, and lakes, and are deposited by them in the neighborhood of their nests—­it may be on the top of a mountain, or in the crevice of a rock.”

“True, I never thought of that.”

“There are a great many philosophers who know more about the motions of stars than these humbler operations of Nature.”

“You are caught there,” said Jack.

“There are philosophers, too, who can do nothing but ridicule the knowledge of others.”

“Caught you there,” retaliated Ernest.

“It was in this way that a bird of the Moluccas has restored the clove tree to the islands of this archipelago, in spite of the Dutch, who destroyed them everywhere, in order that they might enjoy the monopoly of the trade.”

“Still, I must fall back upon my original idea; by sowing a brick, we ought to reap a wall.”

“And if a wall, a house,” suggested another of the young men.

“Or if a turret, a castle,” proposed a third.

“Or a hall to produce a palace,” remarked the fourth.

“There are four wishes worthy of the four heads that produced them!  What do you think of those four great boys, Mrs. Wolston?”

“Well, madam, as they are wishing, at any rate they may as well wish that chinchillas and marmots wore their fur in the form of boas and muffs, that turkeys produced perigord pies, and that the fish were drawn out of the sea ready roasted or boiled.”