Plants and Animals in Harrowyate Waters. 105 



XIV. — Notice of Plants and Animals found in the Sulphureous 

 Waters of Harrowyate and Askern, Yorkshire. By E. Lan- 

 KESTER, M.D., F.L.S., &c. 



In the distribution of organized beings over the surface of the 

 earth, Ave generally find an adaptation of the former to the 

 various conditions of the latter. 



In many marked cases this adaptation is so great, that or- 

 ganized beings cannot exist but in the peculiar circumstances 

 in which they are first engendered. From this law arises the 

 great variety of organized beings which we find adapted to oc- 

 cupy almost every existing condition of matter. There are, 

 however, some conditions of the inorganic kingdom in which 

 organic beings have not been detected, as excessive cold or 

 heat, the absence of oxygen or the presence of injurious gases, 

 &c. The extent, however, of these exceptions is continually 

 on the decrease, and animated beings or their remains are 

 now found in circumstances which but a few years since would 

 have been thought quite impossible. For an increasing know- 

 ledge on this point we are in a great measure indebted to the 

 use of the microscope. By its agency both animal and vege- 

 table productions can be detected in almost all conditions of 

 matter, so that it is difficult to say, with the exceptions of the 

 extremes of heat and cold, under what combination of agencies 

 we might not expect to find a plant or an animal. This ex- 

 tensive adaptation of the one kingdom to the other can now 

 be demonstrated to be essential to the welfare of the whole, as 

 in many instances the lower organic beings derive existence 

 from, and convert into their own substance, those elements 

 which would be destructive of the existence of beings higher 

 in the scale of life. Hence the investigation of this depart- 

 ment of science becomes interesting to the physiologist. 



Among those conditions of matter which, from their powerful 

 influence on man, might be supposed to be destructive of all 

 animal life, are some varieties of those waters which, from the 

 nature of their contents, are called mineral. Some of these 

 have a temperature exceeding greatly that of the human 

 body, yet many of them contain both plants and animals ; in 

 fact, wherever the former are found we may anticipate the 

 existence of the latter. 



On the present state of our knowledge with regard to the 

 composition of mineral and thermal waters a report has al- 

 ready appeared, drawn up by Dr. Daubeny at the request of 

 the British Association for the Advancement of Science ; in 

 this report reference is made to the existence of both animal 

 and vegetable matter in many cold and thermal springs. 



