4>56 M. Dumas on the Chemical Statics of Organized Beings. 



posing any part of it to the fire. I have not yet attempted 

 to join any work in this way, but I consider that I have good 

 evidence of its practicability, in the well-known fact of de- 

 posited copper uniting with any other portion of copper which 

 has been cleaned with nitric acid, quite as intimately as the 

 different parts of the original piece are united. 



In the foregoing remarks I have endeavoured to show, that 

 the system of electro-metallic deposits is capable of producing 

 every article which leaves the workshop of the coppersmith, 

 and that there is no very apparent reason for supposing that 

 it would be too costly to compete with the usual processes of 

 manufacture ; still much of this opinion is speculative, and as 

 yet I have not sufficient experimental evidence to offer in 

 support of it; but such as I have, has fully satisfied me that it 

 is correct. The small toy which accompanied this paper, was 

 made a few days before the meeting, and I believe it is the 

 first symmetrical copper vessel ever produced by galvanic ac- 

 tion. 



LXIX. On the Chemical Statics of Organized Beings. 

 By M. Dumas. 



[Continued from p. 347, and concluded.] 



III. — T ET a seed be thrown into the earth, and be left 

 -*r^ to germinate and develop itself; let the new plant 

 be watched until it has borne flowers and seeds in its turn, and 

 we shall see by suitable analyses, that the primitive seed, in 

 producing the new being, has fixed carbon, hydrogen, oxy- 

 gen, azote and ashes. 



Carbon. — The carbon originates essentially from carbonic 

 acid, whether it be borrowed from the carbonic acid of the 

 air, or proceed from that other portion of carbonic acid which 

 the spontaneous decomposition of manures continually gives 

 out in contact with the roots. 



But it is from the air especially that plants most frequently 

 derive their carbon. How could it be otherwise when we 

 see the enormous quantity of carbon which aged trees, for 

 example, have appropriated to themselves, and yet the 

 very limited space within which their roots can extend? 

 Certainly, when a hundred years ago the acorn germinated, 

 which has produced the oak that we now admire, the soil on 

 which it fell did not contain the millionth part of the carbon 

 tnat the oak itself now contains. It is the carbonic acid of 

 the air which has supplied the rest, that is to say, nearly the 

 " wnoie. 



