THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM. 347 



CHAPTER I. 



THE ROOT. 



NOTWITHSTANDING the unseemly look of its tortuous 

 ramifications, and the disorderly appearance of its absorbing 

 fibres, the root of a tree is none the less organically iden- 

 tical with the regular boughs and symmetrical divisions 

 supported by the stem. Anatomy and experience prove 

 this. 



We sometimes see in forests large branches creeping along 

 the surface of the earth, their lower half buried, while the 

 other is exposed to the air. The former sends out rootlets 

 which sink into the ground, and the other leaves which ex- 

 pand to the bosom of the atmosphere. The same organ, 

 therefore, is at once trunk and root. 



Experiment proves this fact still better. Duhamel in- 

 verted willows, placing their roots in the open air and their 

 boughs in the earth. So identical are these organs that in 

 a short time the roots were covered with leaves, and the 

 stems, transformed into an underground structure, had put 

 out spongioles. This curious experiment succeeded equally 

 well on a large scale. M. de Raguse, in his memoirs, men- 

 tions having seen on the property of a Russian gentleman 

 an avenue of limes which he had in a whim transplanted 

 upside down. The metamorphosis was complete ; all the 

 inverted trees flourished splendidly, and the roots were com- 

 pletely changed into vigorous leafy branches. 1 



1 In the birch- wood of Culloden there is a larch-fir which was blown down in a 



