OX AN IMPROVED MODE OF CULTIVATING THE MELON. 269 



of the truth of an opinion, which I gave many years ago*, that every leaf, 

 even the most distant, of a melon-plant, contributes to feed its fruit. One 

 of my plants exhibited appearances which led me to conclude that a fruit 

 was set, and was swelling rapidly upon it. My gardener, on the contrary, 

 was very positive that no such fruit existed ; and having myself searched 

 in vain to find it, I was compelled to relinquish my opinion ; this however 

 I resumed upon observing the habit of the plant two days afterwards, 

 when I ordered the lights to be taken off, and every branch to be minutely 

 examined. It was then discovered, that a melon, at the extremity of a 

 straggling branch, had fallen through the trellis, and was hanging half a 

 yard below it. In this situation, it had been entirely shaded by the 

 crowded foliage of another plant ; but nevertheless it had grown in less 

 than fourteen days to be nearly a foot long, and it weighed at least four 

 pounds. That it had derived the material necessary to its rapid growth 

 from the sap of the parent plant cannot, I think, be doubted : and the 

 evidence that the most distant part of the plant contributed to feed 

 it, is certainly extremely strong ; for the fruit grew at the distance of 

 at least six feet from those parts of the plant which led me to infer its 

 existence. 



By what means the sap generated in the distant foliage was carried 

 to this fruit in sufficient quantity, is a very interesting question to the 

 physiologist, and not less so to the scientific gardener. 



I have at different periods made an immense variety of experiments to 

 ascertain by what organs, and under what circumstances, the lifeless 

 inorganic matter, which is absorbed by the roots of plants, becomes con- 

 verted into their true sap, or living vegetable blood ; and the result of 

 every experiment has led me to believe, that in all cases where plants 

 possess leaves, as distinct organs, it is in such organs alone, and under 

 the influence of light, that this process takes place. The powers which 

 roots of various forms and cuttings, and other detached parts of plants, 

 possess of emitting foliage have appeared to me to be wholly, in all cases, 

 dependent upon the presence of true sap previously deposited within 

 them. Like the cotyledons of seeds, they appear to be reservoirs only, 

 which contain, but never create : and it has been long ascertained that 

 seedling plants perish, or at best scarcely retain life, if deprived of their 

 cotyledons, even after the radicle has penetrated deeply into the soil, and 

 the elongated plumule has reached its surface ; a discovery which appears 

 to be universally given to Bonnet, but which belongs to Malpighi. 



The following experiment, with many others which I could adduce, 



* See above, n. xxi. p. 189, 191. 



