Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1914-10-17
HAVE PLANTS A SOUL
AND INTELLIGENCE?
Startling Revelations of the Habits
of Plants That Eat Insects, Keep
Standing Armies, Rob, Plunder
and Murder.

Plants are no longer lfeless things,
labeled and grouped under ponderous
Latin titles-they are highly developed
organisms which see, hear, taste, feel,
walk, swim, run, fly, jump, skip, hop,
roll, tumble. set traps and catch fish;
decorate themselves that they may at
tract attention; powder their faces, tmi-
tate birds. animals, serpents, stones; play
hide-and- d-seek; blossom underground pro-
tect their children and send them forth
into the world prepared to care for them
selves-indeed, do all those things which
we ourselves do! We know now that
plants have even minds and souls with
which to think and to worship"
With this startling introduction Royal
Dixon, botanist of wide experience and
one associated with tulip experiments in
America. proceeds to tell, in THE HUI
man Side of Plants" CFrederick A. Stokes
Company, of his amazing observat tions
Of plants and their habits. Mr.. Dixon has
written an extraordinarily engrossing
book-and a book especially designed to
fascinate children and familiarize them
with the wonders of the world of nature.
Plants, declares Mr.. Dixon, actually
perform like human beings-eat, sleep,
make love, walk and fly in the air. 9th
ers again-horrors upon horrors-are can
niba!s and eat living insects.
"A man-eatlng plant grows in Nicaragua
and is always found in deep swamps. For
horror 1t has no rival. The vampire vine
Is not unlike the weeping willow denuded
OF its leaves but is of blackish-brown
color. covered with a thick, gluey resin
that aids it in binding it's prey. BY means
of Its fnger-like claws it is enabled to
catch small animals and envelop them in
a network of its diabolical arms Here
they are hopelessly held until the last
drop of blood is drawn from their bodies
by its infinitesmal sucking mouths
You may not have known that some
plants keep standing armies. Well, listen!
This moral effect of keeping a standing
army is as apparent to plants as to men.
There are some plants that wage war
fare; others. being rich, pay blackmail
to their enemies; rather than fight against
them, some actually hire soldiers and
maintain an armed protective system"
Among the most interesting things in
nature perhaps none Is more striking
than many plants which. like human be-
ings and animals. rob and murder The
murderer Llama Is a parasite OF the most
unscrupulous kind, whose weak stem Is
unable to support its avaricious and pom
derous head, and who, therefore, clngs to
its upright neighbors for support 1t
springs up stalwart tree, sending out
clinging arms, wrapping them around the
body of its victim until at last It reaches
the sunlight. Eventually the sap of the
tree is stopped from flowing and the
Llama waves it's leaves in the breeze as il
exulting over the dead"
Mr.. Dixon tells of an infinite number Of
plants thus given to crime. Strangely |
the majority of them are extraordinarily
beautiful. "Lounging on the treetops,
having nothing TO do, they laugh in their
glory-they toll not, neither do they
SPIN"