“124 ' On the inveried Action 
cortical vessels is interrupted: but I had also another object 
in view. fr 
Every gardener knows that early varieties of the potatoe 
never afford, either blossoms or seeds; and I attributed this. 
peculiarity to privation, of nutriment, owing to the tubers 
being formed preternaturally early, and thence drawing off 
that portion of the true sap, which in the ordinary course of 
nature is employed in the formation and nutrition of blos- 
soms and seeds. 
I therefore planted, in the last spring, some cuttings of a 
very early variety of the potatoe, which had never been 
known to blossom, in garden pots, having heaped the mould 
as high as I could above the level of the pot, and planted’ 
the poriion of the root nearly at the top of it. When the 
plants had grown a few inches high, they were secured to 
strong sticks, which had been fixed erect in the pots for that 
purpose, and the mould was then washed away from the 
base of their stems by a strong current of water. Each 
plant was now suspended in air, and had no communica- 
tion with the soil in the pots except by its fibrous roots; 
and as these are pertectly distinct organs from the runners 
which generate and teed the tuberous roots, I could readily 
prevent the formation of them. Efforts were soon made by: 
every plant to generate runners and tuberous roots; but these 
were destroyed as svon as they became perceptible. An in- 
creased Juxuriance of growth now became visible in every 
plant, numerous blossoms were cinitted, and every blossom 
afforded fruit. 
Conceiving, however, that a small part only of the true 
sap would be expended in the production of blossoms and 
secds, I was anxious to discover what use nature would 
make of that which remained ; and I therefore took effectual 
means to prevent the formation of tubers on any part of the 
plants, exceptthe extremities of the lateral branches, those 
bemg the points most distant from the earth in which the 
tubers are naturally deposited. After an incffective struggle 
of a few weeks, the plants became perfectly obedient to my 
wishes, and furmed their tubers precisely in the places I had 
assiened them. Many of ile joints of*the plants during the 
experiment 
