154 
PLANT OR VANINAL? 
ID you ever stop to ask yourself, “What is the 
difference between a plant and an animal?” 
because this is the place where that question should 
be answered. 
“Why, an animal is altogether different from a 
plant,” you answer, perhaps a little scornfully. “I 
have no trouble in telling which is which.” 
It is very natural that you should feel this way. 
A cow or a horse, for example, is not at all like a 
tree; and when you think of animals, you think of 
the ones you know best, and likewise of plants. 
But wise men have discovered plants that look and 
act so much like animals, and animals that look and 
act so much like plants, that at. one time they say, 
“Now, these are animals, surely,’ and a little later 
exclaim, “No, after all, these are plants;’’ and they 
take a long time to make up their minds as to whether 
certain objects are plants or animals. 
And already even you children have discovered that 
the plants you know best belong to families, and have 
children, and care for them in a very motherly fashion ; 
that they drink earth food with their roots, and eat 
carbon food with their leaves; and soon you will find 
that they do many other things which once upon a 
time you would have thought it a great joke to be 
told a plant could do. 
You remember my telling you of one little plant 
cell that could swim; and there are some animals, 
