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Show Strength of a Flower. A rock split asunder by a growing tree that has found lodgment in what was at first only a small crack is a familiar fa-miliar sight to most people. The force that a tree exerts in accomplishing this feat is tremendous, but relatively It is not equal to that exerted by the' Bower that John Burroughs describes In a recent book, "The Breath of Life." One of the most remarkable exhibl--tlons of plant force I ever saw was in a western city, where I observed a wild sunflower forcing its way up through the asphalt pavement; the folded and compressed leaves of the plant, like a man's fist, hndpushed against the hard but flexible concrete until it bulged up and split, and let the irrepressible-plant irrepressible-plant through. The force exerted must ' have been many pounds. I think it doubtful if the strongest man could: have pushed his fist through such a resisting medium. Life activities are a kind of explosion, explo-sion, and the slow, continued explosions explo-sions of this growing plant rent the pavement as surely as powder would have done. It is doubtful if any cultivated cul-tivated plant could have overcome such odds. It required the force of the untamed, hairy plant of the plains to-accomplish to-accomplish the feat. |