152 Col. VelleyV Remarks on the Nature 



enabled to vary, without difuniting, the general principles of her 

 cftabliflied laws. " Sne difdains," as Mr. Lightfoot has finely ob- 

 ierved, " to be limited by the fyftematic rules of human invention. 

 She never makes any fudden flarts from one clafs or genus to an- 

 other, but is regularly progrcffive in all her works, uniting the va- 

 rious Hnks in the chain of beings by infenfible connections." 



We have lately fcen this myfterious fubje6l difcufled by no ordi- 

 nary inveftigator of Nature's' laws'-^ The principle upon which this 

 difcerning naturalifl proceeds,- appears to be well founded; and if he 

 fails in any refpedl, it is by overftraining his theory to make it qua- 

 dr?ite with the Linnean do6lrine offtorefcence. From this circum- 

 ftance principally, he has, in my opinion, expofed his argument to 

 fome objections vvhicl> niay not eafily be removed. He commences 

 his eflay with^a concife and perfpicuous furvey of the exifting theo- 

 ries laid down by Reaumur, Graelin, and Gaertiier. And as the two 

 lafl: of thofe authors maintain that a very numerous branch of the 

 ^Igas do not in anyinftance deriv£ their origin from feeds, but foleIy» 

 from proliferous gems, or" buds, he oppofes the do6lrine with much 

 ingenuity; not grounding his opinion merely upon the laws. of ana- 

 loo-y, but upon a fcientific and an anatomical inquiry into the natu- 

 ral ftrudlure and conftituent parts, as well as fituation, of thefe cor- 

 pufcles. 1 11 



Having, as far as the nature of the fubjeft would admit, efta- 

 blifhed thefe points fo conlcnant with found philofophy, he pro- 

 ceeds to account for that peculiar proeefs to which the feeds them- 

 felves owe their origin; and this he confiders as an adtual flate of 

 florefcencc. " If pollen," continues this author, ."under, the fliape 

 of- tanna, be unfit for fecundation in the water; if Nature has taken 



* Mr. Correa de Seita on the Trudlificatron Of ihe' fubnierfed Alg^e, in The PhilofophU 



cal Tranfadions for the year 1796, .p, 494- .4 » 



a particular 



