ANIMAL AND VEGETABLE TISSUES. 41 



on the contrary, enters largely into the composition 

 of the albumen, or gelatine, of the soft animal. In 

 some plants it is acknowledged that substances 

 of an animal nature, or abounding in azote, hare 

 been detected ; not, however, constituting a whole 

 plant, but only occurring in certain situations, 

 and always in company with other substances of a 

 decidedly vegetable nature, or consisting entirely of 

 carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. But in the soft 

 animals there is no extensive combination of carbon, 

 oxygen, and hydrogen, into which azote does not 

 enter. Such, then, are the elementary or ultimate 

 principles which make up the compounds of ani- 

 mal organization ; these compounds being gelatine, 

 albumen, osmazone or extractive mucus, sugar, oils, 

 such as spermaceti, fat, and blubber, and various 

 acids, as uric, lactic, benzoic, and many others. Of 

 these chemical elements are constituted the solids 

 and fluids of the animal frame. 



The conclusion thus gained, has not, however, 

 satisfied that intense thirst for knowledge, to which 

 we owe some of the most remarkable and valuable 

 attainments of the human mind. The microscope 

 has been plied minutely, accurately, and perse- 

 veringly, to examine the tissues or component 

 structures of animals and vegetables, and with some 

 degree of success. We shall soon have evidence 

 that the Corallines are chiefly animals ; but some of 

 these, admitted by Cuvier into the same series, have 

 been demonstrated, by the employment of high 



