One Of This Family, `M. Turbiniforme', Is So Colored As To Blend In Well With
The Hue Of The Soil And Stones Around It; And A `Gryllus' Of The Same Color
Feeds On It.
In the case of the insect, the peculiar color is given as
compensation for the deficiency of the powers of motion to enable it to elude
the notice of birds.
The continuation of the species is here the end in view.
In the case of the plant the same device is adopted for a sort of double end,
viz., perpetuation of the plant by hiding it from animals, with the view
that ultimately its extensive appearance will sustain that race.
As this new vegetation is better adapted for sheep and goats in a dry country
than grass, the Boers supplant the latter by imitating the process
by which graminivorous antelopes have so abundantly disseminated
the seed of grasses. A few wagon-loads of mesembryanthemum plants, in seed,
are brought to a farm covered with a scanty crop of coarse grass,
and placed on a spot to which the sheep have access in the evenings.
As they eat a little every night, the seeds are dropped
over the grazing grounds in this simple way, with a regularity
which could not be matched except at the cost of an immense amount of labor.
The place becomes in the course of a few years a sheep-farm,
as these animals thrive on such herbage. As already mentioned,
some plants of this family are furnished with an additional contrivance
for withstanding droughts, viz., oblong tubers, which, buried deep enough
beneath the soil for complete protection from the scorching sun,
serve as reservoirs of sap and nutriment during those rainless periods
which recur perpetually in even the most favored spots of Africa. I have
adverted to this peculiarity as often seen in the vegetation of the Desert;
and, though rather out of place, it may be well - while noticing
a clever imitation of one process in nature by the Cape farmers -
to suggest another for their consideration. The country beyond
south lat. 18 Deg. abounds in three varieties of grape-bearing vines,
and one of these is furnished with oblong tubers every three or four inches
along the horizontal root. They resemble closely those of the asparagus.
This increase of power to withstand the effects of climate
might prove of value in the more arid parts of the Cape colony,
grapes being well known to be an excellent restorative in the debility
produced by heat: by ingrafting, or by some of those curious manipulations
which we read of in books on gardening, a variety might be secured
better adapted to the country than the foreign vines at present cultivated.
The Americans find that some of their native vines yield wines superior
to those made from the very best imported vines from France and Portugal.
What a boon a vine of the sort contemplated would have been
to a Rhenish missionary I met at a part in the west of the colony
called Ebenezer, whose children had never seen flowers, though old enough
to talk about them!
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