236 Retrospective Critichm» 



yearly attentive practice tends to confirm every word I have advanced, 

 with many additional facts, which probably may be laid before the public 

 when gentlemen phytologists and practical men have had time to divest 

 themselves of the prejudices, so long grounded on errors, handed down 

 from one writer to another, without any one doubting the accuracy of 

 such apparently sound reasoning. It is an easy thing for an expert critic to 

 garble out such parts of any scientific paper as will (with a little perver- 

 sion) produce a seemingly good criticism. for the moment; but this subject 

 is too intricate to be loosely handled. 



Mr. A. S. the first has taken a review of the experiments, without even 

 noticing the time and temperature recorded therein, else he would have 

 discovered what produced the second vegetation of the sickly vine. Only 

 just cut the head off a young oak, or any other tree, and wait for the 

 vernal atmospheric influence, and the analogy of the case will appear. 

 This gentleman has not advanced one single idea to controvert the con- 

 clusions to be drawn from experiments, but has advanced opinions founded 

 on the very facts which the experiments go to prove (and which he calls 

 " mistaken notions ") ; namely, that the primary motion of limpid sap 

 originates in imbibitions of the buds and spray, and descends to the ex- 

 tremities of the roots before the extension of roots or the vegetation of 

 branches takes place. This is the sum total of all I have attempted to 

 prove both in the experunents and essay ; and if any practical man, who 

 has to provide early grapes, peaches, &c., should adopt such practice as the 

 experiments point out, taking the time and temperature there recorded 

 as the principle of his proceeding, he will find (as I have) something 

 more certain and satisfactory than the "laudable amusement" of A. S. 

 the first. 



Mr. A. S. the second commences his remarks by reciting my quotation 

 fi'om Miller's Dictionary, and states the reason of failure in early grapes, 

 &c. I really wish this gentleman had disputed the assertions of Malpighi 

 and Grew, and all their followers, thirty or forty years since ; he would 

 have saved me and other practical men many days and nights of painful 

 anxiety for the loss of early crops. I cannot admit any merit to this 

 Mn A. S. for telling your readers that which my experiments have already 

 proved : and there can be no doubt but that Miller was right about deep 

 planting ; else, why do the most sturdy oaks and other hard-wooded trees 

 sicken and die, when undue masses of earFh are mounded on their roots 

 and boles ? 



The account of Van Helmont's willow was taken from Parkes's Chemistry; 

 and if- 1 have di-awn more than the mere quotation from (my old fi'iend) 

 Mitchell's Dendrorogia, it is more than I know. This Mr. A. S. adverts to 

 the "powerful pen of Mr. Main," very justly : Mi*. Main's criticism is of 

 sterling merit. If he had put those vine grafts on, and watched their 

 progress himself, he could not have illustrated that experiment more 

 clearly. — J. Thompson, sen. Welbeck, Feb. 1831. 



Corrections and Additions respecting the Habitats of a few Plants published 

 in the Botanical Magazine. — Sir, Permit me to point out a few errors 

 that appear in some Numbers of the Botanical Magazine, respecting the 

 habitats of a few of the plants figured there. Although every one who 

 has any taste for botany must admire the abilities of the gentleman who 

 conducts that work, yet I trust an humble individual may, without pre- 

 sumption, point out an error which that gentleman may have inadvertently 

 fallen into. In the Bot. Mag. for May, ] 828, a figure is given of Hous- 

 t6ni« 5erpyllif61ia, and in a note added by Professor Graham, he says, 

 " found by Mr. Blair on the tops of the mountains of New Hampshire, 

 growing amongst abundance of Andromeda //ypnoides and Menzies/a 

 caerulea." This is correct, except that the Andromeda grew on the rocks, 

 and the other two within a few yards of it. The A. /^ypnoides is given 



