ORIGIN OF PLANTS 
vast world of vegetable life which enriches the 
world today, the Algae have always gone on 
reproducing their own kind. ‘Today we can 
watch, under a microscope, the activities of the 
first form of terrestrial life, born incalculable 
aeons ago. 
Mayhap the earth would be peopled exclu- 
sively by Algae and similar forms today, if it 
had not been for a prehistoric accident. One 
day, the water suddenly receded from a bit of 
Jand and left some Algae in the mud behind it. 
Now, the Algae had always been used to plenty 
of water and they saw that unless they did some 
quick thinking, they were in danger of drying 
up and blowing away. Accordingly, by common 
consent, they secreted and surrounded them- 
selves with a jelly-like mass capable of absorb- 
ing and holding water. The amphibious Liver- 
worts and the Ricciocarpus Natans do the same 
thing today. 
With the Algae successfully living in the 
mud, surrounded by their mucilaginous water- 
reservoirs, it was but a step for some enterpris- 
ing individual to extend a portion of his own 
tissue in search of more water. By this simple 
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