166 ANIMALS AND PLANTS. 



where we can hope to find any absolute distinction be- 

 tween animals and plants, unless we return to their mode 

 of nutrition, and inquire whether certain differences of 

 a more occult character than those imagined to exist by 

 Cuvier, and which certainly hold good for the vast ma- 

 jority of animals and plants, are of universal application. 



A bean may be supplied with water in which salts 

 of ammonia and certain other mineral salts are dissolved 

 in due proportion ; with atmospheric air containing its 

 ordinary minute dose of carbonic acid; and with noth- 

 ing else but sunlight and heat. Under these circum- 

 stances, unnatural as they are, with proper management, 

 the bean will thrust forth its radicle and its plumule ; 

 the former will grow down into roots, the latter grow up 

 into the stem and leaves of a vigorous bean plant ; and 

 this plant will, in due time, flower and produce its crop 

 of beans, just as if it were grown in the garden or in the 

 field. 



The weight of the nitrogenous protein compounds, 

 of the oily, starchy, saccharine and woody substances 

 contained in the full-grown plant and its seeds, will be 

 vastly greater than the weight of the same substances 

 contained in the bean from which it sprang. But noth- 

 ing has been supplied to the bean save water, carbonic 

 acid, ammonia,.potash, lime, iron, and the like, in com- 

 bination with phosphoric, sulphuric, and other acids. 

 Neither protein, nor fat, nor starch, nor sugar, nor any 

 substance in the slightest degree resembling them, has 

 formed part of the food of the bean. But the weights 



