62 THE STOEY OF THE PLANTS. 



and this protoplasm is the ultimate living matter, 

 the "physical basis of life;" the thing without 

 which there could be no plants or animals 

 possible. 



What is protoplasm — this mysterious stuff, 

 which builds up the bodies of plants and animals ? 

 It is a curious transparent jelly-like substance, 

 full of tiny microscopic grains, and composed of 

 carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and sulphur. 

 Sometimes it is almost watery, sometimes half- 

 horny, but as a rule it is waxy or soft in texture. 

 It is very plastic. Its peculiar characteristic is 

 that it is restlessly alive, so to speak ; seen under 

 a microscope, it moves about uneasily, with a 

 strange streaming motion, as if in search of 

 something it wanted. It is, in point of fact, the 

 building-material of life ; and out of it the living 

 parts of every creature that lives, whether animal 

 or vegetable, are framed and compounded. 



But it is plants alone that know how to make 

 protoplasm. Animals can only take it ready- 

 made from plants, and burn it up again by 

 reunion with oxygen in their own bodies. The 

 plant manufactures it. The animal destroys it. 

 Chlorophyll or the active green-stuff of leaves is 

 a special modification or variety of protoplasm ; 

 and chlorophyll alone possesses the power to 

 manufacture new energy-yielding and living 

 material, under the influence of sunlight, from 

 the dead and inert bodies around it. The 

 materials which it thus produces are afterwards 

 worked up by the plant, together with the 

 nitrogen, sulphur, and phosphorus supplied by 

 the roots, into fresh protoplasm and fresh 



