532 ORGANOLOGY. 



terms to the Rhizocarpece and the Phanerogamic we must call the vesicle 

 (sac of the embryo) which receives the pollen-grain the male, and the 

 anther the female organ. 



Of the utmost importance, and a problem yet to be solved, is the perfect 

 history of the development of the bud from the individual cell, or group 

 of cells, in which it has its origin. For this purpose the axillary buds can 

 hardly be employed, as they are developed so early, that the cellular tissue 

 itself, in which they originate, would throw great difficulties in the way. 

 The buds of Bryophyllum cah/cinum and the adventitious buds of stems 

 (which may be artificially produced) seem to offer a means of solving this 

 problem by very careful research. 



207. Every formative effort, especially in the organic world, 

 establishes the possibility that some characters of the individuals 

 which we regard as unessential, and yet falling under the idea of 

 species, may vary within certain limits. The determination of 

 essential and non-essential characters can only be arrived at when 

 we shall know the construction of all the processes of formation. It 

 has been heretofore supposed, that only regular reproduction could 

 bring forth the essential characters of the individual, and irregular 

 reproduction the unessential. This is entirely false ; it depends on 

 the peculiarities of individual plants, how far they are changeable 

 in their characters in general, and how far they have a tendency to 

 produce, through reproduction, unessential characters in the new 

 individual. The general rule might perhaps be thus expressed : 

 the longer and the more intimately the newly-developing plant has 

 been in connection with the parent plant, the more will the forma- 

 tive energy impress upon it both its essential and non-essential 

 characters. Hence, with reference to the several kinds of increase, 

 we come to the conclusion, that, under generally similar circum- 

 stances, plants grown by division or from buds will closely resemble 

 the parent plant in all their characters ; buds, the more closely, the 

 further their development had proceeded in connection with the 

 parent plant ; and in regular reproduction, the farther that the 

 embryo has been developed under the influence of the parent plant, 

 the more like to it will be the characters of the plant which is 

 produced from it. 



Lastly, it is to be remarked, with respect to the Phanerogamia, 

 Rhizocarpece, and some Agamia provided with roots, that the bud, 

 when organically united on one side with the parent plant, never 

 developes a true root, but an adventitious root. 



Physiology, and we may almost add Botany, has paid attention 

 entirely to the Phanerogamia rather than to plants in general ; the 

 remaining plants have been grievously neglected, or treated in an off- 

 hand way, according to false analogies. Hence we find in the old 

 systems that the function of reproduction has been almost exclusively 

 regarded, from the cases most easily observed, as increase by means 

 of either seeds or buds. The foregoing paragraphs will have shown 

 how unjustly circumscribed is this view. Connected with this subject, 

 we must allude to a point which even the superficial observation of the 

 seed and bud suggests. We often find it asserted, " The seed repro- 



