TRANSMUTATION OF PLANTS. 115 



the kind produced by a decomposing infusion, or 

 a bed of decaying solid matter, will depend as much 

 upon the influence of the material employed, as upon 

 the germ itself which is the subject of it."* 



Anaong the questions proposed by the Academy 

 of Sciences at Haarlem, in 1839, was one upon the 

 following subject — " According to some botanists, 

 Algae of a ver}- simple structiu-e, placed under 

 favourable circumstances, develop and change 

 into different plants, belonging to genera much 

 more elevated in the scale of organic being ; al- 

 though these same algae, in the absence of such 

 favourable circumstances, wotdd be fertile, and re- 

 produce their primitive form."t I would ask if 

 this is a point as yet settled in the negative. The 

 original of our cabbage is well known to be a 

 trailing sea- side plant, entirely different from the 

 cabbage in appearance. The cardoon and arti- 

 choke are now admitted to be one, and Mr. Darwin 

 was assured by an intelligent farmer that he has 

 seen, in a deserted garden, the latter plant re- 

 lapsing into the former. 



It is well known, that when fresh- water mol- 

 lusks are exposed for a little time to an influx 



* Carpenter's Physiology, p. 62. 

 t Charles worth's Magazine of Natural History, ii. 448. 



