/ 



330 PROPAGATION. 



light, cannot be compared with those which are matured 

 in the full blaze of a summer sun ; and hence melons grown 

 in frames covered with mats, and carefully excluded from 

 the influence of that solar light which is indispensable to 

 them, have, whatever may be their external beauty, none of 

 that luscious flavour which the melon, when well cultiva- 

 ted, possesses in so eminent a degree. 



PROPAGATION. 



The next subject of consideration is the mode of multiply-^ 

 ing improved varieties of fruit, so as to continue in the pro- 

 geny exactly the same qualities as existed in the parent. 

 Unless we have the power of doing this readily, the advan- 

 tages of procuring improved races would be very much cir- 

 cumscribed ; and the art of horticulture, in this respect, would 

 be one of the greatest uncertainty. The usual mode of in- 

 creasing plants, that mode which has been more especially 

 provided by nature, is by seeds ; but, while seeds increase 

 the species without error, the peculiarities of varieties can 

 rarely be perpetuated in the same manner. In order to 

 secure the multiplication of a variety, with all its qualities 

 unaltered, it is necessary that portions should be detached 

 from the original individual, and converted into new indi- 

 viduals, each to undergo a similar dismemberment, with 

 similar consequences. It happens that while in animals 

 this is impracticable, except in the case of polypes, the sys- 

 tem of life in a plant is, of all others, the best adapted to such 

 a purpose. We are accustomed to consider individual 

 })lants of exactly the same nature as individual animals : this 

 is, however, a vulgar error, which is dissipated by the slight- 

 est inquiry into the nature of a plant. A plant is really an 

 animated body, composed of infinite multitudes of systems 

 of life ; all, indeed, united in a whole, but each having an 

 independent existence. When, therefore, any number of 

 these systems of lite is removed, those which remain, as 

 well as those which are separated, will, under fitting cir- 

 cumstances, continue to perform their natural functions as 

 well as if no vmion between them had ever existed. These 

 systems of life are buds, each having a power of emitting 

 descending fibres in the form of roots, and also of ascending 

 in the form of stem. The first of these buds is the embryo ; 

 the others are subsequently formed on the stem emitted by 

 the embryo. As these secondary buds develop, their de- 



