VAHIETTES OF SECRETIONS. T^l 



mark a variety in all these plants, and not to constitute 

 a specific difference. It is however perpetuated by seed. 



It is cui ions to observe, not only the various secre- 

 tions of different plants, or families of plants, by which 

 they differ from each other in taste, smell, qualities and 

 medical virtues, but also their great number, and strik- 

 ing difference, frequently in the same plant. Of this 

 the Peach-tree offers a familiar example. The gum of 

 this tree is mild and mucilaginous. The bark, leaves, 

 and flowers abound with a bitter secretion of a purgative 

 and rather dangerous quality, than which nothing can be 

 more distinct from the gum. The fruit is replete, not 

 only with acid, mucilage and sugar, but v\ ith its own 

 peculiar aromatic and highly volatile secretion, elabo- 

 rated within itself, on which its fine flavour depends. 

 How far are we still from understanding ihe whole anat- 

 omy of the vegetable body, which can create and keep 

 separate such distinct and discordaiit substances ! 



Nothing is more astonishing than the secretion of 

 flinty earth by plants, which, though never suspected till 

 wiihiii a few }ears, appears to me vvell ascertained. A 

 sul)-.tancc is found in the hollow stem of the Bamboo, 

 fAriindo Bamhos of Linnaeus, Nastos of Theophrastos,) 

 cahtd Tabaxir or Tabasheer, which is supposed in the 

 East Indies (probably because it is rare and difficult of 

 acquisition, like the imaginary stone in the head of a 

 toad) to be endowed with extraordinary virtues. Some 

 of it, brought to England, underwent a chemical exam- 

 ination, and proved, as nearly as possible, pure flint. 

 See Dr. Russell's and Mr. Macie's papers on the sub 



