Philosophy of Botany. 2*75 



isted, quite different from those of the present day, which may 

 have facilitated autogony. 



The organic history of this globe must have had its begin- 

 ning in an age when the oceans were united, forming an unin- 

 terrupted surface, and the temperature of the waters suffi- 

 ciently decreased to allow the formation of albuminous com- 

 pounds. This may have been not far from the boiling point, 

 as we even now find living organisms in natural springs of 

 high temperature. I picture in my fantasy the incumbent at- 

 mosphere charged with irrespirable gases, filled with immense 

 masses of vapors inclosing the ocean in impenetrable dark- 

 ness, which was relieved only by the diffuse phosphorescence 

 of floating luminous corpuscles; the waters charged with 

 mineral solutions, ready for precipitation with progressing 

 refrigeration ; the sky luminous from uninterrupted electric 

 flashes ; and the atmosphere trembling from incessant pealings 

 of thunder, and whirled about by furious cyclones. 



Then already may possibly the hot waters of the primordial 

 oceans have been peopled by living beings. Their high tem- 

 peratures may even have been favorable to their coming into 

 existence, as we even nowadays find oscillatories and alga* 

 in hot springs at 140^. In the geysers of Yellowstone Park 

 live Conferva major and Phormidium laminosum, flourishing 

 by 162° to 176°, while the albumen of the higher organism 

 ■coagulates at 162° Fahr. As there is reason to believe, as 

 above stated, that the surface of the globe was shrouded in 

 darkness, or only illuminated by dift'used light, until the sun 

 broke through the clouds, we must take into account that the 

 gelatinous bodies of the schizomycetes and algae of this time 

 contained a bluish green substance; the phycocyanin in dif- 

 fusion through their bodies, whose carbon-absorbing function 

 was not confined to any granular or cellular formation, like the 

 chlorophyll, which came into existence afterwards with the 

 higher vegetable forms and for whose action a weaker illumi- 

 nation sufficed. 



It is a permissible speculation that the enzymes or form- 

 less ferments may have played an important part in the genesis 

 of life. Wf, have long known of a number of albuminous, 

 ■soluble substances which chemists called " enzymes," or 



