178 ANIMALS KILLED IV. 
ts 
The fame privilege is poffeffed by the tremella, 
which is an aquatic plant, placed by botanifts in 
the clafs Conferva(1). If it chance to be in a 
veflel where the water fails, it dries and lofes its 
verdure ; but water being fupplied, it foon re- 
covers its original ftate. Nature does the fame 
as art. IJ have feen, from the beginning of July 
till 
ber of revivals ; but'this fa merits farther inveftigation: 
After eighty days deficcation, it immediately revived. 
—T. 
(1): Naturalifts have lately difputed much concerning 
the nature of Conferve. By chemical analyfis, they give 
produéts chiefly peculiar to the vegetable kingdom: 1. 
They give out an acid, and a {mall quantity of ammoniac,. 
combined with pyromucous acid; 2. They contain muriat 
and carbonat of potafh ; and, although foda may be found: 
in them,. we know that itis alfo found. in many vegeta- 
bles ; 
their vegetable nature. This analyfis was made by Vau- 
3. The quantity of afhes is rather an indication of 
quelin,, who concluded from it that conferve had a great- 
er relation to the vegetable than the animal kingdom, 
M. Decandolle has compared the fentiments and difcove- 
ries of modern naturalifts on the fubjeét ;. and, in a judi« 
cious memoir, he thinks ‘ Conferve are neither interme. 
diate beings between animals and vegetables, polypi, nor 
polypiers ; neither are they aggregates’ of animalcula, but 
real vegetables, analogous to tremellx, fuci, and lichens,” 
Rapport fur les Conferves, Journal de Phyfique, tom. 54x 
Pp: 422. 
