Sect. XXXIX. 2. 1. GENERATION. 3 U 



cfFufed on the female fpawn after its production. 2d. In refpect 

 to vegetables, it rouft be recollected, that their vefiels are fo mi- 

 nute in diameter, that they have not in general been of fufficient 

 fize to be injected by coloured fluids ; and are not thence fo 

 vifible by microscopes as thofe of animals, and that it is probable, 

 thole of the ftigma ox piitillum of flowers, which are defigned 

 to abforb the Solution of the anther-duil, which adheres to the 

 moifl ftigma, may be always empty, or have their mouths doted* 

 except when they are Simulated into action by the anther-duft, 

 and may thence more eafily efcape observation. Nor do I know, 

 that any one has endeavoured to detect -thefe vefFels by experi- 

 ments with coloured liquids applied along with the male farina 

 on the ftigma for its abforption, or by directing the piftillum as 

 in its recent or dry ftate, or by obServing it in a ftate of charcoal. 



In regard to quadrupeds, Dr. Haighton has fnewn by a num- 

 ber of curious experiments on rabbits, publifhed in the Philo- 

 Soph. Tranfact. for the year 1797, that the male femen does 

 not permeate the fallopian tubes, and confequently never arrives 

 at the female ova, either in a liquid or aerial ftate ; but that it 

 is by the ftimulus of the femen in the neck of the uterus ; that 

 the veficles of the ovaria fwell, and difcharge the material, which 

 has been called an ovum /though it does not pofTefs a diftinguifh- 

 able form ; and that this is acquired and carried into the uterus 

 by the periftaltic motions of the fallopian tubes, Some hours af- 

 ter copulation. Here I fuppofe it finds the male femen, and 

 that thus the new animal produced by the fecretion of the male 

 jfinds correfponding nutriment and fituation in the female in all 

 Sexual progeny. But that no female apparatus is required in the 

 production of the buds of trees, or in the adherent fetus of the 

 polypus, or of the coral-infects. 



In objection to this theory of generation it may be faid, if the 

 animalcuia in femine, as feen by the microfcope, be all of then*, 

 rudiments of homunculi, when but one of them can find a nidus, 

 what a wafte nature has made of her productions ? I do not ak- 

 fert that thefe moving particles, vifible by the microfcope, are 

 homunciones; perhaps they maybe the creatures of ftagnation or 

 putridity, or perhaps no creatures at all j but if they are fup- 

 pofed to be rudiments of homunculi, or embryons, fuch a pro- 

 fufion of them corresponds with the general efforts of nature to 

 provide for the continuance of her fpecies of animals. Every 

 individual tree produces innumerable feeds, and every individual 

 fifh innumerable fpawn, in fuch inconceivable abundance as 

 v/ould in a fnort fpace of time crowd the earth and ocean with 

 inhabitants; and thefe are much more perfect animals than the 

 ammaleuia in femine can be fuppofed to be, and pcrifh in un- 

 counted 



