92 



FOREIGN NOTICES. 



the ki\YCst, animate or inanimate, SM'imminfj in the 

 sea, or in tiie air, or the siirl'ace olthe earth or hii- 

 ricd beneath it, wliicli is not, upon examination, 

 Ibiiiid to be as beautiful as il' it were finished for no 

 other purpose than to be looked at? Take the shell 

 that lies at the bottom of the oeean, the bird that 

 bathes his winijs in heaven's purest lipht, the flow- 

 ers that carpet the earth with their varied splendor, 

 the rjlitterinji stars that liffht up the deep arches of 

 the skies with an eternal glory — take the combina- 

 tion of the countless elements of beauty, when the 

 morning slowly lifts uji the veil of night, and as at 

 the dawn of the creation, reveals the glories of the 

 visible world ; or when spring breathes upon the 

 earth, and recals the dead to life, and myriads and 

 myriads of forms of new things come forth at her 

 voice — take the descending sun as he reclines upon 

 his western throne, and wraps around him the gor- 

 geous robe of unrivalled majesty — take the perfec- 

 tion of beauty as sei n in a nearer but more trans- 

 cendant form in man himself, in his symmetrical sta- 

 ture, in his well turned limbs, in the web of unmelted 

 softness and texture which covers him, in the tints 

 of his complexion, in the grace of his movements, 

 in the melody of his voice, in the eloquence of the 

 eye. pouring out the fires of genius, or radiant with 

 the charms of the aflfections that speak so power- 

 fully to the soul — and will, then, men say that ap- 

 pearance is nothing, and that the pleasures of the 

 sight are not to he valued and cultivated ? I say, 

 that appearance is always to be regarded, and that 

 we cannot render our homes too beautiful and at- 

 tractive. Home is the paradise of human life, and 

 poor and wretched, indeed, must that creature be 

 who, looking roimd the habitable world, cannot 

 point to one nook of earth, and say, " There is my 

 home?" Our first object should be to make our 

 homes as convenient and comfort- ble as we can 

 make them, and our second object should be to render 

 them, to an equal extent, tasteful and elegant. 

 London Garden, and Florist. 



Analogies in Animals and Plants. — The 

 functions of animals and plants are in a like degree 

 analogous. Animals take in their food by the agen- 

 cy of the mouth, and prepare it for digestion either 

 by various degrees of mastication, or by attrition, 

 as in the gizzards of birds. In this they difl'er from 

 plants ; but these have a sufficient compensation, 

 inasmuch as that they imbibe their food in a fluid 

 form, liquid or aeriform, and consequently in a state 

 already of the finest possible division. Animal and 

 vegetable remains are their common food, and salts 

 of various kinds are their condiments and stimidants; 

 plants having this advantage over animals, that as 

 they absorb only the soluble and finer parts of their 

 nutriments, and their absorbing organs have the 

 power of rejecting that which is offensive, they 

 have no offensive matters to separate, such as aj»- 

 pear in the excrements of animals. 



In the animal stomach, the lood uadergoes an ex- 

 tensive change, being reduced to a pulp of greater 

 specific gravity, and being altered entirely both in 

 taste and odor. In the sap vessels of plants, which 

 may be truly considered as their primary organ of 

 digestion, their f^od or sap undergoes a change pre- 

 cisely similar ; its colour and flavor are altered, and 

 its specific gravity increased. 



From its stomach, the animal's food passes into 

 the intestines, is there subjected to the action of the 

 bile, and the chyle or nutritive portion separated 

 from that which isexcrcmentitious. In its passage 

 through the intestines, the chyle is ahsorlied by the 

 lacteal vessels, and conveyed into the blood ; and 

 these mingled liquids are propelled by the heart in- 

 to the lungs; to be there exposed to the action of 

 the air. The vital litiuid now changes its purple 

 hue to a florid red, loses a portion of its carbon and 

 watery particles, the former combining with the 

 oxygen of the atmospheric air in the lungs, and 

 being breathed forth in the form of carbonic acid 

 gas. As plants take in as food no gross unneeded 

 ingredients, it is obvious that no process like the bi- 

 liary operation is retjuired in their course of diges- 

 tion But in them the food or sap, proceeding at 

 once along the branches, is poured into the leaves, 

 which are the very lungs of the vegetable world. 

 Here, as is the blood, its colour i« changed, and 

 oxygen emitted from il during the light hours of the 

 tW'ent3'-four ; but carbonic acid is breathed forth dur- 

 ing the night, and at all periods, a considerable 

 amount of watery vapor is emitted. 



From the lungs, by the agency of the heart, the 

 blood is propelled through the arteries over the 

 whole animal frame, supplying nourishment and 

 warmth to all the parts, and where, by those being 

 abstracted, it is again converted into purple or ve- 

 nous blood, and is returned by the veins to undergo 

 a repetition of those changes already noted as be- 

 ing efTccted in the lungs. In plants, the sap, after 

 exposure to the action of the air in their leaves, is 

 returned by another set of vessels, situated in the 

 bark, ministering to the growth and support of the 

 whole plant. It is true, that only under certain 

 circumstances, detailed in another chapter, is heat 

 evolved daring the processes of vegetation ; but the 

 circulation of the sap in plants, beyond all doubt, 

 enables them to resist the frosts, the most intense 

 and prolonged, we find the interior of trees remain 

 unfrozen ; and under the meridian sun of the tropics, 

 the sap of the palm and all other trees retains a tem- 

 perate coolness. This power to resist extremely 

 elevated and depressed temperatures ig characteris- 

 tic of all animated nature. 



Such is the close similarit}' in the digestive and 

 circulatory processes characterising the members 

 of the two great kingdoms of organised nature, a 

 resemblance which obtains in all the other functions 

 enjoyed by them in common. During respiration, 

 the air inhaled by animals through the mouth and 

 nostrils, proceeds immediately to the lungs, and 

 acts upon the blood ; in plants, the air inhaled by 

 their leaves operates instantaneously upon the sap. 

 The changes M'hich occur have been detailed in pre- 

 vious pages, and there it has been shown, that as 

 oxygen is the vital air of animals, so that gas and 

 carbonic acid gas are equally essential to plants. 

 If animals be placed in a situation where they in- 

 hale pure oxygen, their functions are highly excited 

 and increased in rajiidity ; but it is an exhilaration 

 speedily terminating in exhaustion and death, if the 

 inhalation be continued for a protracted time. So 

 plants will flourish with an increased vigor in atmos- 

 phere containing one-twelfth of carhonic acid, but 

 even this brings on premature decay ; and if it ex- 



