336 STUDIES IN LIFE AND SENSE. 



inertness of the vegetable kingdom, as compared with the animal 

 world, can no longer on any ground be reasonably maintained. 

 The origin of these peculiar phases of plant-life remains obscure ; 

 but the biologist legitimately enough may be led towards considera- 

 tions connected with community of development, in his attempts to 

 explain the likenesses which exist between the two great series of 

 living beings. Despite the divergent lines along which the ordinary 

 course of vegetable-life pioceeds, when compared with the ways of 

 animal existence, the analogies of the two kingdoms are writ large 

 enough in the by-ways of plant-evolution. 



