COMPENDIUM 



BOTANY 



CHAPTER I. 

 VEGETABLE LIFE 



AND 



DISTINCTIONS BETWEEN PLANTS AND ANIMALS. 



Natural History is the name of the science which 

 examines and developes the nature, properties, and mu- 

 tual relations of natural objects, comprehending the 

 Mineral, Vegetable, and Animal Kingdoms, under the 

 three divisions of Mineralogy, Botany, and Zoology. 



Minerals are readily distinguished, being destitute 

 of organization and life, subject only to chemical and 

 mechanical laws. But the other kingdoms of nature 

 are so intimately blended, possessing properties which 

 like the colours of the rainbow emerge into each other, 

 that many have attempted to define their respective 

 limits without success. They are both organised, and 

 equally under the controul of a living principle, whose 

 &*^laws, the greatest efforts of human ingenuity have not 

 been able to expound. This principle of life, it is 

 said, consists in a power to resist putrefaction, and to 

 a certain extent to maintain a temperature different 

 from that of surrounding bodies. It is obvious that 

 this definition is alike applicable to animals and plants. 

 Both possess the power to resist chemical agency, both 

 preserve their own temperature, which is sometime* 

 higher and sometimes lower, than that of the surround- 



