A case in point occurs within a short distance of my house. The walls of an ancient edifice having shown symptoms of yielding, and some ominous cracks made their appearance, a couple of very sturdy buttresses had been erected, in order to stop further damage. Unfortunately, the builder was ignorant of the principles of architecture, and though he made the buttresses very strong and massive, he omitted to make a solid foundation on which their bases should rest. Consequently he only hung the buttresses, so to speak, on the wall, and helped to tear it asunder by the additional weight. [Illustration: PADDLE-WOOD TREE.] [Illustration: BUTTRESSES.] * * * * * NATURE, as well as Art, supplies her buttresses. In our own country we find the natural buttress more or less developed in our trees, as it is wanted. Take, for example, any plantation, and examine the trees. It will be found that those in the centre, which are sheltered on all sides from the force of the wind, shoot up straight towards the light, have comparatively slight and slender stems, and occasionally display such energy in forcing themselves upwards, that when two branches find that there is not room for both, they form a sort of alliance, fuse themselves together, and force their united way towards the sky. Take, however, the trees in the outside rows of the plantation, and see how they throw out their straight roots and branches towards the outside, and how, on the inside, their trunks are as smooth and their roots as little visible as those of the trees that grow in the centre of the plantation. Almost any tree will develop itself in this fashion, showing that instinct can rule the vegetable as well as the animal world. There is, however, a South American tree which far surpasses any of our trees in its power of throwing out spurs or buttresses, principally, I presume, because it may have to endure the fiercest storms from any quarter and at any time. So bold are these projections that several men would be hidden if standing between two of them, and so numerous are they that if a section of the tree were taken at the base of the ground, it would resemble a conventional star or asterisk, *, rather than an ordinary tree-trunk, O. The scientific name of this curious tree is _Aspidomorpha excelsum_. The natural buttresses are so thin and so wide that they look like large planks set on end, with one edge against the tree. Indeed, they are used as planks, nothing more being required than to cut them from the tree.