EXTRACTS PROM FOREIGN JOURNALS. 1^7 



man., become equally vivacious and woody. Dianthus caryophyllus and ligno- 

 susy are very suitable for receiving the graft of annuals or biennials, as Z). 

 sinensiSj barbatus, moschatus, so common in gardens. The grafted plants 

 should be taken into the house in winter. The Potato, a vivacious plant, 

 has been grafted upon the Purple Bindweed, and has caused the latter to be 

 so far vivacious as to live three years ! Its stem has become thicker than a 

 goose-quill. " It was expected by this means,*' says M. P^pin, " to hasten 

 the flowering of the Potato, which to this day is scarce of flowers ; but if ex- 

 perience has not realized this hope, the result is not the less interesting." 

 May we not conclude, from this observation, that the species grafted not 

 having exhausted the subject by the flowering, this has become vivacious, 

 as if it had been prevented from flowering without being grafted ? This 

 method, which at first sight appears singular, is, notwithstanding, probably 

 a confirmation of the principle that it is the formation of seeds that kills an- 

 nuals. — Alphonse De Candolle, in the Bib. Univers. de Geneve, No. 12. 



GEOLOGY. 



On, the Basilosaurus ; a new Genus of Saurian Fossil, discovered 

 IN America. — The discovery of this species is due to Judge Bree, of Ark- 

 ansas, who found, in 1834, the first vertebra on the fenny margin of the river 

 Washita. Towards the close of the same year, other vertebrae, fragments of 

 the lower jaw, &c., were discovered at Alabama, thirty miles from Chair- 

 bome. Several immense vertebrae, teeth, ribs, parts of the shoulder, hume- 

 rus, tibia, &c., have been obtained ; and in May, 1835, another skeleton, pro- 

 mising a rich collection of fossil remains, was found. Near it was a vertebra 

 of the tail of the Mosaurus, or Crocodile of Maestricht. All these bones, 

 though differing in their proportions and size, belong to the same species ; 

 the structure of the lower jaw, which is hollow, indicates that it is an extinct 

 genus of the Saurian class. The comparatively small size of' the bones of 

 the extremities, seems to prove that the tail was the principal organ of mo- 

 tion ; the anterior members ought to have been fins. The row of vertebrae, 

 extending to more than 100 feet in one specimen, and estimated at upwards 

 of 150 feet in that of Arkansas, proves this enormous animal to have attained 

 or even exceeded these dimensions ; and it well deserves the name it has re- 

 ceived — Basilosaurusj or King of the Saurians. 



MINERALOGY. 



The probable Origin or the Diamond — Naturalists have proposed 

 hypotheses as to the origin of the diamond which ascribe it to a vegetable, 

 and not a mineral, formation. Jameson attributes it to the vegetable secre- 

 tion of some patriarchal or antediluvian Baobad or Banyan tree of the world 

 before the flood. Brewster considers the stratum in which it is found as nei- 

 ther the production of water or fire, and the diamond itself, like amber, from 

 its combustibility and its powerful reflective properties, as a consolidation of 

 vegetable matter, which has gradually acquired crystallization. Jameson's 

 view is supported by many remarkable analogies of the formation of silex in 

 various Indian plants, as the formation of lime is known to take place in 

 others. The genus Chara is especially rich in the latter as well as the ex- 



