of the Organic Systems of Vegetables. 89 



organs and functions must be, nay have been, frequently con- 

 founded with each other ; and the obscurity is increased by 

 each external organ being too exclusively considered as the 

 seat alone of its predominant function ; as the root of absorp- 

 tion without respiration ; the leaves of respiration without 

 absorption ; the flowers of reproduction, &c., whereas the 

 ascending caudex will frequently evolve radicles, and the 

 descending as frequently propagate by subterranean buds. 

 But of this enough, to it we shall return at another time. It 

 is curious to note into what errors a contrary doctrine has led 

 its advocates, by some of whom it has been affirmed that leaves 

 never absorb, and that roots can never develop buds: when, 

 in fact, it is notorious that even in the most segregated ex- 

 amples, some traces, though faint, may frequently be found of 

 that primitive community of function in which the original 

 simple structure was all-sufficient for every purpose ; when 

 each and every part was nutrient and generant alike, before 

 either root, or stock, or herbage, as distinct organs, were de- 

 veloped ; and by reverting to this consideration, we shall find a 

 clue to explicate some of those apparent paradoxes which seem 

 to have bewildered the vegetable physiologist : e. g. gardeners 

 have practically become convinced that seeds, and the roots of 

 plants, when covered with too thick a stratum of soil, refuse to 

 grow; and foresters have also found, that when large trees 

 have been embanked they have languished and generally died. 

 By many this was attributed to the accumulation of earth round 

 the trunk, and hence when raised roads have been to be made 

 through groves or plantations, cylinders of brick have fre- 

 quently been built round trees at a very considerable expense, 

 to prevent, if possible, their destruction. This was the case 

 near the new bridge in Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens, 

 but the trees, in spite of this precaution, as might have been 

 foretold, still have died: for the shock that, under such cir- 

 cumstances, they receive, arises not from the inclosure of the 

 trunk by earth, but from the suffocation of the roots, which 

 the sudden embankments exclude from the access of air; and 

 this before any fresh roots can be protruded nearer to the 

 surface, which would take place during a more gradual depo- 

 sition of extra soil ; and thus in the instance alluded to, those 



