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MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



certain that the simple cell contains the rudi- 

 ments necessary to the formation of the other 

 organs, and especially the spirals, which in 

 their most perfect state appear to be the most 

 complicated of the whole series. " There is 

 no doubt," observes Dr. Lindley, speal?mg 

 of the different kinds of vegetable tissue, 

 " that all these fonns are in reality modifica- 

 tions of one common type, viz., the simple 

 cell, however different they may be from 

 each other in station, function, or appearance. 

 For, in the first place, we find them all devel- 

 oped in bodies that originally consisted of 

 nothing but cellular tissue ; a seed, for instance, 

 is an aggi-egation of cells only ; after its vital 

 principle has been excited, and it has begun 

 to grow, woody tissue and vessels are gener- 

 ated in abundance. We must, therefore, 

 either admit that all forms of tissue are de- 

 veloped from the simple cell, and are conse- 

 quendy modifications of it : or we must sup- 

 pose, what we have no right to assume, that 

 plants have a power of spontaneously genera- 

 ting woody, vascular and other tissues, in the 

 midst of the cellular." Mirbel has lately re- 

 duced the first of these suppositious to very 

 nearly a demonstration ; in a most admirable 

 memou- on the development of Marchantia, 

 he 62:)eaks to the following effect: " I at first 

 found nothing but a mass of tissue composed 

 of bladders filled with little gi-eeu balls. Of 

 these some grew into long, slender tubes, 

 pomted at each end, and unquestionably ad- 

 hering by one of their ends to the inside of 

 the sac ; others from polygons passed to a 

 sf)herical form m rounding off their angles. As 

 they gi-evv older, other very important changes 

 took place in certain cells of the ordinary 

 structure, which had not previously under- 

 gone any alteration ; in each of these there 

 appeared three or four rings placed paral- 

 lel with each other, adhering to the mem- 

 brane, from wliicli they were distinguished 

 by their opaqueness ; these were together 

 analogous to annular ducts. The cells which 

 became tubes did not at first differ from other 

 cells in anything except their form ; their 

 sides were uniform, thin, colorless and trans- 

 parent; but they soon began to thicken, to 

 lose their transparency, and to be marked all 

 round from end to end with two contiguous 

 parallel streaks disposed spirally. They then 

 enlarged and their streaks became slits, which 

 cut the sides of the tubes from end to end 

 into two threads, whose circumvolutions sep- 

 arated into the resemblance of a gun-worm." 

 In these cases there can, I think, be little 

 doubt that the changes witnessed by Mirbel 

 were chielly owuig to the development of a 

 spiral thread in the inside of the tissue. 



There is much diversity of opinion as to 

 the mode in which the elementaiy organs of 

 vegetables are multijilied during the advance 

 of growth, and the rapidity with which that 

 growth proceeds in certain plants is such 

 as to render actual observations as to its 

 source exceedingly difficult ; speculation has 

 therefore sometimes taken the lead where 



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sober inquiiy has jiroved at fault, pointing at 

 results almost too startling even for human 

 imagination to receive as tnith ; and yet, 

 when we contemplate from day to day tho 

 increasing size of many plants in ordinary 

 cultivation — a gourd, for instance, or vege- 

 table marrow, adding to its circumference 

 nearly three inches in the course of the 

 twenty-four hours, and the stem which bears 

 it extending its length between five and six 

 inches diu-ing the same period, common sense 

 would pause ere it questioned the tiTith of 

 records much more marvelous. The rapid 

 gi'ovvth of the common mushroom has become 

 pi-over])ial, but some other individuals of the 

 class of fungi greatly exceed it in that respect ; 

 the Phallus or stink-horn sometimes elevates 

 itself six inches from the ground in the space 

 of an hour ; the Bovista gigantea, or great bull 

 putl-ball, is recorded to have grown in the 

 course of a single night from a mere point to 

 the size of a large gourd, the actual measure- 

 ment of which is not mentioned, but on a 

 moderate computation of the diameter and 

 number of the cells, it has been estimated to 

 have increased at the rate of 4,000,000,000 of 

 cells in every hour, or upwai'd of 6G, 000, 000 

 in a minute. It is true that much of this en- 

 largement may have arisen from the disten- 

 tion of the cells individually ; but even if this 

 be admitted, the force of development and 

 the vast increase of weight, which can only 

 be accounted for by an appropriation of nutri- 

 ment so rapid as almost to elude conception, 

 leaves sufllcient of the wonderful to impress 

 upon our mind a just idea of the grandeiu- of 

 that vital energy which inspires and regulates 

 the gi'owth of bodies thus low in the scale of 

 organic nature. 



The force with wliich the minute organs 

 above described arc produced and enlarged is 

 no mere supposition, but a fact within the reach 

 of attestation by those who w-ill condescend 

 to observe its operation ; the root of a tree 

 descending through a crevice will break and 

 dislocate the hardest rock ; cellular tissue, 

 not harder in substance than pith, has elevated 

 a weight with the power of a lever; the lat- 

 ter effect is not unfrequently seen in tho 

 growth of fungi under stones and heavy blocks 

 of timber ; and the following anecdotes, both, 

 I believe, referring to the same circumstance, 

 and copied from the Hampshire Advertiser of 

 .luly, 1830, are recorded by Professor Burnet 

 as affording a striking instance of this power: 

 " At different times, several of the stones in the 

 pavement in the town of Basingstoke, were ob- 

 served day by day, to be rising gi-adually from, 

 their beds, nntil they were some inches above 

 the ordinary level ; under one of these, which 

 ■weighed seven pounds, a large mushroom was 

 found, that measured a foot in circumference." 

 The other case is recorded by Mr. .Joseph 

 Jefferson, who says: " A toadstool six or sev- 

 en inches in diameter, raised a large paving- 

 stone an inch and a half out of its bed ; and the 

 mason who had the contract for paving was 

 much ennicred at the idea that a weak fungus 



