18 



with Bacon, to admit nothing that bears not the stamp of trial and the signet of 

 inductive scrutiny ; be it mine to accept no theory as valid, that is not the off- 

 spring of accumulated facts, collected from the roll and register of multiplied and 

 diversified experiments ; be it mine never to torture or to twist, lengthen or 

 shorten, with the inquisition of a Procrustes, however ingenious may be the 

 device and cunning, facts and experiments to suit preconceived whims and 

 fancies ; be it mine, also, with Newton, to trace the phenomena of the universe of 

 being, up to their divine origin and sublime and awful source. 



I cannot, therefore, but rejoice, that, in your prospectus, you have avowed 

 yourselves as determined never to forget the dependence of the whole on the one 

 Divine Originator. I am sure numbers will join with me, in wishing every suc- 

 cess to a periodical that comes to us so highly recommended ; and I am quite cer- 

 tain there can be no sound philosophy that does not recognize an intelligent first 

 cause, and a prospective and legislative Providence. 



By way of apology for these preliminaries, I beg to communicate, ad inte- 

 rim, a few miscellanea, as an earnest of something more elaborate for an early 

 number. 



I. — Natural Ventilation of Seeds. 



This occurs to me as one among many questions of curious interest in the 

 physiology of plants ; though I believe it has been entirely overlooked. The 

 seed-vessel of the Heart's-ease is pendent and reversed ; the seeds are ultimately 

 naked and exposed till the period for their dispersion arrives, when the seed-vessel 

 becomes erect, and adjusts its open valves to imbibe the direct rays of the sun- 

 beam. In the former case, it is evident that rain could not injure the immature 

 seeds, nor moisture lodge within the cavities. In some plants we find the reverse 

 of all this, the exception being provided for their peculiar contingencies. The 

 Butter-nut, is supplied with an open slit, or natural vent, for the specific 

 purpose of ventilation ; and there is, also, for the same reason, a circular 

 orifice at the apex of the shell that encloses the triangular Brazilian Nuts — a shell 

 possessed of adamantine hardness. By this opening atmospheric air, as in the 

 former case, gains admission. In the capsules of the Poppy, the ventilating 

 orifices are beneath the canopy which crowns them. On both sides of the Hura 

 crepitans, or Monkey's Dinner-bell, there are narrow meshes, or windows, by 

 which the air circulates, matures the seeds, and promptly dries up whatever mois- 

 ture may find an occasional lodgement within the shell ; it would, otherwise, 

 explode long before the period of maturity supervenes. In the Hernandia 

 sonora, or Whistling Jack-in-a-Box, the air winds among the avenues of the 

 seeds, there being a round aperture on the summit of the capsule, and the seeds 

 occupying only a limited portion of the inner chamber : the tree thus becomes 



