98 



Shortly previous to this sheet going to press, I received 

 through the kindness of Alex, von Humboldt the splendid 

 work on the metamorphosis of plants, which M. Turpin has 

 recently published *. It contains only seventy-nine pages, but 

 of very small print, and in the largest folio ; three plates ac- 

 company it, designated by 3, 4, 5, and drawn by M. Turpin, 

 and on their account very probably the inconvenient folio size 

 has been chosen. 



We are already acquainted with M. Turpin from the c Ico- 

 nographie Vegetale/ as a botanist who has his peculiar no- 

 tions on the metamorphosis of plants, which however have 

 met with great opposition, especially in Germany. In the 

 present work he has brought forward the same views, only in 

 a somewhat different form, without paying the least attention 

 to the many valid objections made by E. Meyer in the seventh 

 volume of the Linnaea. Upon the first plate M. Turpin has 

 represented a typical or ideal plant to prove the ee unite de 

 composition organique" as well as the radiate or centrifugal de- 

 velopment and the original identity of all the appendiculated 

 parts. It is divided into a Systems terrestre and a Systems 

 aerien ; the former appears to me particularly incomplete, al- 

 though it is correctly represented as an immediate continuation 

 of the stem. The pith of the stem proceeds through the whole 

 of the main root to its apex, while the collateral roots take 

 their origin in the wood. The axis of the aerial system of the 

 ideal plant is terminated by the embryo, which in one case is 

 situated with its radical apex on it, and in the second case is 

 attached to it by a kind of umbilical cord. On the second 

 plate are represented a beautiful series of splendid monstrosi- 

 ties of various parts of the inflorescence, several of which may 

 be quite new, and some of which I shall subsequently enume- 

 rate, without agreeing with M. Turpin as to their signification. 



On the last plate three beautiful proliferous centifolial 

 roses are figured with great art, the sepals have become con- 

 verted into common leaves, and moreover the gradual change 

 of the petal into anther is demonstrated. I regret from want 



* Esquisse d'Organographie vegetale, fondee sur le principe d'unite et de 

 composition organique et devolution rayonnante ou centrifuge pour servir a 

 prouver 1'identite des organes appendiculaires des vegetaux et la metamor- 

 phose des plantes de Goethe. Paris, 1837, fol. 



