402 On the Physiology of Vegelahles. 



conjecture, whether I sliould not find also a germ in the heart 

 of each seed while in the root, and mounting the alburnum ves- 

 sel ? since it mu^^t probal)!v be in ihe former the seed would first 

 take its shoot. But fancying that this must be a verv difficult 

 matter to see, from its extreme minuteness, I prepared my solar 

 microscope with all its powers, and picked out the most oily oi 

 the Jirn, as well as a specimen ofthe lari^cst heart of the seed: — 

 the first in the Piniis rubra, the seeds ot which are remarkably 

 clear and fiill of bark juice; the second in the Cactus, which 

 -seed has an excessive large heart: .and choosing a very sunny day, 

 1 at length discovered the germ, not onlv in the heart of the fir- 

 seed while in the root, and in the alburnum; but more obscurely 

 in the Cactm. The former, indeed, was verv plain in six se- 

 parate hearts, which I placed in one field of view. 1 perceived 

 not only the germ to each, but tiie same species of root, or jelly- 

 like m«//er, bfoore J'ound aUsn:hed to the l)eginning sprout of 

 the sea-weed, and imitated in the buckwheat, (fig. 3,) which ap- 

 pears also in the heart of the fir, (lig. 5.) 



The regular process, therefore, seems to be — that the heart of 

 the seed mounts with its germ from the root, where it takes it 

 in, into the seed-vessei, and proves itself to be the seed not onlv 

 by my being able to trace it through its whole progress to fructi- 

 fication, but by having the same germ in the heart it afterwards 

 displays spreading from the primordial branch all around the 

 embryo, after the seed is fructified : and thus, when the seed is 

 fit to place in the ground, it is not only the embryo that is pre- 

 ])ared to throw up its shoot, but the female flower is also fitted 

 for its increase, and fixes, by means of the various germs in the 

 seed, the beginning stripe for each line in the wood, (which I 

 showed in my last letter,) and serves as a commencement also 

 of flower the next year, in each flower-bud. The flower there- 

 fore, that is the cor and pericarp, is continued from plant to 

 ))lant, while the male is renewed and rc})roduced vearly in 

 every tree. This accounts for the bark and pollen in a graft 

 never joining, while every other part is strictly assimilated. This 

 proves also that I was riuht in saying that the stripes of flowers 

 in the wood were formed /lot the year tliey appear at tlie ex- 

 terior ofthe plant, but the preceding: indeed the appearance of 

 the two is so dissimilar not only in form and size, but in situa- 

 tion al'^o, that it is impossible to take them for each other; the 

 first being simply in stripes, but those which are to open the 

 present year, both in trees and herbaceous plants, are discovered 

 not only larger, but in all sorts o( festoons, wreaths, and bou- 

 queli, making the richest and most beautiful patterns. 



Thus r niiiy be now said to have brought the history of the 



foundation 



ja. 



