80 WONDERS OF ORGANIC LIFE. 



— popularly we look upon the whole plant as 

 an individual. Yet every botanist knows that 

 it is a combination of individuals, and if so, 

 each series of buds must certainly be strictly 

 regarded as generations."* Professor Owen 

 observes, that " Both plant and zoophyte 

 proceed to develope by gemmation — the one a 

 succession of leaves, the other of polypes, asso- 

 ciated by the continuous growth of the connecting 

 parts ; and finallj, the plant by metamorphosis 

 of part of the stem and certain leaves, produces 

 the flower or fructification, and the zoophyte, 

 by a modification of its stem, and certain polypes, 

 produces an egg- vesicle, or a modified polype, or 

 a medusiform individual, which is set free ; in 

 both cases the end to be attained is the diffusion 

 of the species by means of impregnated seeds 

 or ova." The learned professor places before 

 us the grand characteristics of plants, as organic 

 beings, in a striking, and we may add, original 

 manner ; but our prescribed limits prevent us 

 from following him.! 



Plants exhibit several modes of continuing 

 their respective species ; some propagate only 

 by seeds, which the wind scatters abroad, and 

 which, dropped in favourable spots, germinate 

 and grow. These seeds are vitalized in the 

 pericarp, capsule, drupe, or seed vessel, what- 

 ever be its character, from which in due time 

 and by various methods they are liberated. 



* Magragraph on British Naked-Eyed Medusae, 

 t See his Introductory Discourse to the Hunterinn Lectures, 

 U49. 



