J 857.] The Root. 99 



tlie credulity of its members — that a tree would grow by being plant- 

 ed with the top downward in the ground, and the roots upward, and 

 good authorities cited in proof. Although this is doing violence to 

 nature's more obvious laws, the phenomena here presented, can be 

 accounted for, on the same general principle with the practice al- 

 ready spoken of, of making branches develop roots, and — vice versa 

 — roots develop branches — so common among nurserymen. The 

 only difference is, they choose to take a single branch or root, and 

 not the whole tree ; and he who can give the rationale of the devel- 

 opment and growth of the one, under such circumstances, can also, 

 without any great violence to his logic, do it of the other. He who 

 will assert, however, that the roots become branches^ or the branches 

 roots, knows not of what he affirms, and if he intends to convey 

 such an idea, it is erroneous. Leaves can not be chan<?ed into roots, 

 nor roots into leaves ; but when a tree or its branches, are thus 

 placed top foremost into the earth, the buds containing the rudi- 

 mentary plants, situated in the axilla of the leaves, true to their 

 own nature — containing, as they do, an undeveloped tree in all its 

 parts — send downward the roots, their plumules remaining dormant ; 

 while the dormant adventitious or abnormal buds of the roots, ex- 

 posed, as they are, to such influences as are suited to the develop- 

 ment of buds, develop and expand them into leaves and branches. 

 We can here conceive how such a monstrosity — with its inversion 

 of sap vessels and all — may vegetate. But unless the system of 

 root grafting and layering shall become vastly more popular than 

 at present — which is only an approximation to this remarkable trans- 

 formation of nature's plan of doing things — we feel assured that 

 the practice of inverting her order, by planting the top downward, 

 and the roots upward, will not become prevalent. True, as Mr. 

 LONGWORTH often quaintly says, ' in these days of spirit rappings, 

 stranger things than this may be expected.' 



The forms of roots vary greatly with the manner in which the in- 

 ferior axis descends, and divides into branches. "When this central 

 inferior axis is not impeded or removed, it tapers gradually, throw- 

 ing out its laterals, and these again their fibrous lines, forming what 

 is called the faj) root. Thus, the various roots of a tree con- 

 tinue to lengthen as the tree continues to grow, forming as they 

 extend, additional cellular tissues at their extremities, possessing 

 the power of absorbing, if not selecting, the matter presented to 

 them ; in other words the food best suited to their wants. And when 



