Many plants are wonderful weather prophets and keepers of time. Their reactions to the coming of night, showers, heat, cold and other natural phenomena show much wisdom. That plants require the rest which accompanies sleep is indicated by the weakened and degenerate condition of individuals which are sometimes forced to exceptionally rapid development by continual exposure to electric light. A human faculty which few people associate with plants, is an acute sense of taste. How else do the plants know what elements to absorb out of the soil? Certain experiments have enabled investigators to discover marked taste preferences of a number of microscopic plants. Bacteria are exceptionally fond of kali salts. Though they thrive equally well on glycerine, they can be lured from it at any time by the toothsome kali solution. A sense of taste plays a remarkable part in the fecundation of Moss. The male element is composed of swift-swimming cells equipped with vibratory hairs. When deposited by the wind or other means on the cups of the female flower, they swim about in the moisture until they are eventually enticed to the unfertilized eggs at the bottom by their taste for malic acid. That this is no idle theory can be proved in the laboratory. The seed-animalcules of some of the Ferns also are urged to the act of impregnation by their preference for the sugar in the seed cups. All through the plant world we see actions and habits which are the reverse of automatism or mere instinctive response. Every plant continually has to meet new and trying conditions, and while its reactions, just like those of man, are frequently in the terms of racial and individual experience, it is constantly called upon to make new and novel decisions. Consider the intelligence of a wild Service Tree described by Carpenter. As a seed, it sprouted in the crotch of an Oak, and at once sent a lusty root down toward the earth. As it descended the Oak trunk and neared the ground, its further progress was barred by a large stone slab. It is authentically recorded, that, when still one and one-half feet away, the tip of the root, by direct perception or occult means, discovered the presence of the obstruction, and, at once splitting into two equal branches, passed on either side of the stone. A more remarkable case is that of a tropical Monstera, which, coming into life on top of a greenhouse, sent canny and vigorous roots directly down to certain water tanks on the ground. Isolated instances of plant intelligence might be mere coincidences if it were not for the fact that they multiply greatly the further one investigates. The common Potentillas and Brambles show remarkable sagacity in searching out hidden veins of soil among the rocks where they grow. Nothing is more ingenious than the way in which Hyacinths, Primroses and Irises smother competitive seedlings by putting forth large, low-lying leaves to cut off the light of neighbours.