VEGETABLE FIBRINE, & c . 49 



served for the nutrition of the latter. Vegetable 

 fibrine and albumen take the same form in the 

 stomach of the graminivorous animal as animal 

 fibrine and albumen do in that of the carnivorous 

 animal. 



From what has been said, it follows that the de- 

 velopement of the animal organism and its growth 

 are dependant on the reception of certain principles 

 identical with the chief constituents of blood. 



In this sense we may say that the animal organ- 

 ism gives to blood only its form ; that it is incapable 

 of creating blood out of other substances which do 

 not already contain the chief constituents of that 

 fluid. We cannot, indeed, maintain that the animal 

 organism has no power to form other compounds, 

 for we know that it is capable of producing an 

 extensive series of compounds, differing in composi- 

 tion from the chief constituents of blood ; but these 

 last, which form the starting point of the series, it 

 cannot produce. 



The animal organism is a higher kind of vege- 

 table, the developement of which begins with those 

 substances, with the production of which the life of 

 an ordinary vegetable ends. As soon as the latter 

 has borne seed, it dies, or a period of its life comes 

 to a termination. 



In that endless series of compounds, which begins 



with carbonic acid, ammonia, and water, the sources 



of the nutrition of vegetables, and includes the 



most complex constituents of the animal brain, 



E 



