OF PLANTS. 93 



sistent form, but only the course of its development, can 

 be the object of a study of form in Botany; every system 

 which devotes itself to the isolated formal relations of this 

 or that epoch, without regard to the law of development, 

 is a fanciful air-castle, which has no foundation in actuality, 

 and therefore does not belong to scientific Botany." 



It is not at all my intention to unfold all the separate posi- 

 tions which Morphology has hitherto secured, or is believed 

 to have secured, from the observation of facts under the 

 guidance of these maxims; this would be nothing less 

 than to write a whole system of Botany. Here I can only 

 proffer a general view of the Vegetable World, sketched 

 according to its morphological characters. 



Regarding the vegetable kingdom as a whole, as an 

 individual, the various stages of life and development of 

 which lie as close beside each other, as they follow after 

 one another in a single plant, we are enabled to regard the 

 simplest form as also the commencement of the Vegetable 

 World ; and then we find that this, like the individual plant, 

 is produced and developed from a simple cell. When on 

 old, damp walls and palings, or in glasses in which we 

 have let soft water stand for several days in summer, we 

 find a delicate, bright green and often almost velvety coat, 

 we meet with the first beginning of vegetation. Under 

 the microscope, we detect in these green masses a number 

 of small, spherical cells filled with sap, colourless granules 

 and chlorophyll. In other places occur similar cells, but 

 yellowish, brown or red, and almost all, at least at present, 

 may be regarded as perfect plants, which have received 

 various names from Botanists. The most suitable name 

 for them is Protococcus, primary vesicle. From this 

 simple cell, vegetating as an independent plant, the develop- 

 ment of the vegetable world takes its departure, and ascends 



