Electricity upon Minerals. 83 



An amethyst, sapphires, rubies, and garnets, with many 

 ordinary mineral substances, gave no indication either of natu- 

 ral or acquired phosphorescence. 



In conclusion, I may be allowed to remark, that I am not 

 aware that the phosphorescent property has ever been restored, 

 or imparted, to this class of bodies, by any other means. 



Note. The consideration of other varieties of fluor, and 

 the duration of the effects, as well as other circumstances bear- 

 ing upon the preceding facts, may form the subject of a future 

 communication. 



ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE SEVERAL ORGANIC 

 SYSTEMS OF VEGETABLES, 



with reference to their Functions ; and especially on the Respiration of Plants, 

 as distinguished from their Digestion. 



BY GILBERT T. BURNETT, ESQ. 



TN no subject has indeterminateness, arising from conflicting 

 dogmata, prevailed in a more perplexing, in a more dis- 

 heartening degree than in the general philosophy of life, and 

 particularly in the physiology of plants. At one time even 

 vitality was denied to exist in them : their curious structures 

 and still more curious functions being all considered as merely 

 mechanical and chemical phenomena. When subsequently 

 their vitality was proved, the reaction perverted the very truth 

 that it established, by attributing to simpler plants the organs 

 of the more complex animal frame : thus we hear of the arte- 

 ries, the veins, and the nerves of plants ; of the uterus, the 

 vagina, and the testes: the roots have been declared lacteals, 

 and other parts placental vessels ; the leaves have been con- 

 sidered lungs or gills, and in their functions sometimes they 

 have been compared to kidneys: again, the wood has been 

 esteemed the osseous compages of the plant, and the pith, its 

 spinal marrow, or the centre of its nervous system ; which last 

 idea introduced the absurd doctrines of the instincts, sensation, 

 and perceptivity of vegetables. Nay, when not even a sem- 

 blance of parallelism could be either found or feigned, as was 



G 2 



