554 Vegetahle Vitality. [November, 



It is alleged by some tliat there is a deterioration of vegetable vi- 

 tality in plants propagated by buds and bulbs. To such we com- 

 mend the following article, taken from the London Gardeners' 

 Chronicle^ edited by the learned naturalist, Prof. Lindley : 



" The species of plants, like those of animals, appear to be eter- 

 nal, so far as anything mundane can deserve that name. There is 

 not the smallest reason to suppose that the Olive of our days is dif- 

 ferent from that of Noah ; the Asa dulcis, stamped upon the coins of 

 Cyrene, still flourishes around the site of that ancient city ; and 

 acorns figured among the sculptures of Nimrod seem to show that 

 the same Oak now grows on the mountains of Kurdistan as was 

 known there in the days of Sardanapalus. There is not the slight- 

 est evidence to show that any species of plant has become extinct 

 during the present order of things. All species have continued to 

 propagate themselves by seeds, without losing their specific peculi- 

 arities ; some appointed law has rendered them and their several na- 

 tures eternal. 



It would seem, moreover, that, with the exception of annuals and 

 others of limited existence, the lives of the individual plants born 

 from such seed would be eternal also, if it were not for the many 

 accidents to which they are exposed, and which eventually destroy 

 them. Trees and other plants of a perennial nature are renovated 

 annually; annually receding from the point which was originally 

 formed, and which in the nature of things must perish in time. The 

 condition of their existence is a perpetual renewal of youth. In 

 the proper sense of the word, decrepitude can not overtake them. 

 The Iris creeps along the mud, ever receding from the starting point, 

 renews itself as it advances, and leaves its original stem to die as its 

 new shoots gain vigor ; in the course of centuries a single Iris might 

 creep around the world itself, if it could only find mud in which to 

 root. The Oak annually forms new living matter over that which 

 was previously formed, the seat of life incessantly retreating from 

 the seat of death. When such a tree decays, no injury is felt, be- 

 cause the center, which perishes, is made good at the circumference, 

 over which new life is perennially distributed. In the absence of 

 accidents, such a tree might have lived from the creation to this hour; 



