98 On the Anatomy of Vegetalles; intended to suhfanttate 



of powder forming in the extremities of the side-roots. (Plate I. 

 fig. 1 .) Continuing to open a fresli tree as the season advanced, 

 and following up the ingredient in the interior, I saw that 

 powder soon coagulate and form into balls, which, increasing by 

 degrees, moved in a few weeks through the root in every direc- 

 tion, till they all centred in the different vessels of the alhurnum 

 (fig. 2), and then mounted in a slow movement, tied togctlier by 

 a slight thread of the line of life. Continuing my exainination, 

 I suddenly discovered tliat the balls had left the alburnum cylin- 

 der, and were collected around different buds at the extremity of 

 the last year's shoot (fig. 3). In my next specimens I saw that 

 the balls were entirely left to themselves, while all the buds were 

 in the very act of running up into the new shoot. In the fol- 

 lowing specimen they were regularly fixed there, the shoot 

 being just formed by the fresh flow of the sap, and completed 

 by this process. The next appearance showed the balls collect- 

 ing at the bottom of the new shoot, aggregated into the figure 

 of a mulberry (fig. 4). I now redoubled my attention, impatient 

 to see what would follow ; when I found that a vessel had been 

 formed (while the balls were collecting), and had dipped into each 

 separate bud (0,0,0) . The next process was the running in of 

 the balls into this vessel (see MM), when so many were regularly 

 dropped into each pericarp, drawn in by degrees by means of 

 the line of life which tied all the balls together (fig. 5). As soon 

 as the balls entered the seed-vessel, a part surrounded them and 

 seemed to fix them in their appropriate places, and the seed- 

 vessel closed ; but on cutting it open several times within the 

 ne.ict fortnight, no further change had taken place ; but a very 

 great alteration in the flower, which had gained its calyx and pe- 

 duncles. In less than a fortnight more the flower was sufficientiv 

 advanced to commence the fructification of the seeds; and the 

 line of life passing through each ball, a fissure began to be per- 

 ceived in the interior (see Lime-seed) , which was und'tiibtedly the 

 embryo of the plant . And the following specimen showed most 

 plainly, that those very halls, formed at the extremities of the 

 side-roots, running through the middle root to the alburnum, 

 and fixed in the seed-vessel, were really tlie heart of the seed, 

 .since the progressive i)icture finished by the growth of the em- 

 hryo in the hall. 



Is this a system ? or. Is it not rather the exact copying of the 

 interior progress of a plant, in which neither the imagination nor 

 even the reason of the dissector has aught to do? I have blindly, 

 I think, followed my copy; my specimens exactly show the dif- 

 ferent pictures I have explained. How then can they be just, 

 and the explanation false, since they are regularly traced to th(i 

 fructification of the t>ted ? And how can they be nourishment, 



since 



1 



