PLANT. LIFE 



CHAPTER I 



INTRODUCTORY ASEXUAL PLANTS 



IN the beginning PROTOPLASM. This wonderful sub- 

 stance, which Huxley has aptly called " the physical 

 basis of life," received its name at the hand of Mohl of 

 Tubingen in 1846. The term is derived from two Greek 

 words protos, first; plasma, form. Protoplasm is a 

 slimy, gelatinous substance, of uncertain chemical con- 

 stitution, fundamental to the existence of both plants 

 and animals. It is known to contain carbon, nitrogen, 

 oxygen, hydrogen, and some sulphates and phosphates 

 of magnesium, potassium, and calcium; but no chemist 

 has combined these constituents in such a way as to 

 form living protoplasm. Besides the chemical com- 

 ponents, the chemist has to reckon with the great factor 

 Life and Life is distinctly elusive. We have to bear 

 in mind that the chemist in analyzing protoplasm must 

 necessarily kill it in the process; he analyzes a corpse, 

 from which the chief glory, Life, has been dismissed. 

 Even supposing that the constituents of dead proto- 

 plasm may be combined in the laboratory in such a way 

 that living protoplasm results, are we to conclude that 

 Life has been created, that it would be a laboratory 

 product ? Such a conclusion is by no means inevitable, 



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