Mr. Steedman attempted to detach a root of one of the plants from its bed of mud, but the little tendrils branching from it on every side held the root firmly in its place. At last he succeeded in extricating the little white threads, one by one, and removed the entire plant to the bank. Its root, which is eaten in Madagascar, was very like the ginger root, and had a tough, light-brown skin. Harry carefully placed the leaves of the plant in his herbarium, while his father packed the root, with its native soil, in a tin case, preparatory to sending it to the Botanical Society in London. "Harry," he said, as they finished their work, "this plant could be easily reared in our green-houses--heat and moisture being all that is required. But nature seems to have jealously surrounded these beautiful leaves with almost impassable barriers, and the lace-plant is comparatively unknown. "But come, my boy Raheh says '_maly-massandro_' (the sun is dead), and it will be as long as 'two cookings of rice' (two half hours) before we can be ferried across to yonder village and secure a place to pass the night." And so, after Raheh had given Harry one last drink from the clear, cool river, in the odd-looking leaf-cup he carried for the purpose, the tired but successful lace-leaf hunters crossed over to the Hova village and were soon fast asleep. THE CARICATURE PLANT. BY M. A. One of the most remarkable plants in the whole vegetable kingdom is that known to botanists as the _Justicia Picta_, which has also been well named "The Caricature Plant." At first sight, it appears to be a heavy, large-leafed plant, with purple blossoms, chiefly remarkable for the light-yellow centers of its dark-green leaves, which cause them to look as if some acid had been spilled upon them and taken the color out wherever it had touched. As I stood looking at this odd plant and thinking what a sickly, blighted appearance the queer, yellow stains gave it, I was suddenly impressed with the fact that the plant was "making faces" at me. Still, unaccustomed as I was to seeing plants indulge in this strictly human amusement, I was slow to believe it, and stooped to read the somewhat illegible inscription on the card below the plant--"_Justicia Picta_, or 'Caricature Plant.'" My first impression was correct then. This curious shrub had indeed occupied itself in growing up in ridiculous caricatures of the "human face divine," until it now stood, covered from the topmost leaf down, with the queerest faces imaginable. Nature had taken to caricaturing. The flesh-colored profiles stood out in strong relief against the dark-green of the leaves. A discovery of one of these vegetable marks leads to an examination of a second and a third leaf, until all are scanned as closely and curiously as the leaves of the comic papers that form the caricature plants of the literary kingdom.