of the Domestic Gardener'' s Manual. 531 



every recorded fact, it has been my fate to meet with disap- 

 pointment. I never in one instance have found that the 

 natural subject discovered those parts or proportions that are 

 figured in plates, or detailed in description. There is some 

 over-colouring, some mental illusion, some self-imagining, 

 that invariably throws one back upon one's own resources ; 

 at least, I, through life, have found it so ; — have not you ? 

 These uncertainties lead to great perplexity, they sap autho- 

 rity, and tend to engender the mental feeling that " nothing 

 is, but what is not." 



Not to digress farther: on the 7th of April, 1830, we 

 opened the first-formed cherry, and found it to correspond 

 pretty closely with that described by Keith, May 4. ; " inter- 

 nally " (say my notes), the hollow space showed the stone 

 and kernel, or the embryo of both, like a transparent little 

 pea : the substance was totally unorganised ; it appeared to be 

 a mass of simple jelly. We pursued our investigations almost 

 daily : still, nothing occurred of any material moment. Keith's 

 detail refers from the 4th to the 8th, 12th, 16th of May; then 

 he adds, *' the tubes and spiral vessels forming the umbilical 

 cord, and conducting the sap from the fruit-stalk to the nucleus, 

 were seen, by the assistance of a microscope, upon the longi- 

 tudinal section of the ovary." My second note is dated 

 April 23. " In sixteen days the nucleus has not increased to 

 any great extent ; from it a greenish yellow skin, or testa, was 

 readily detached, leaving the gum inside, a white, tough, 

 semitransparent, oval mass, homogeneous in substance, and 

 otherwise unorganised. No connection appears to exist with 

 the pericarp, nor is any umbilical cord discernible : it (the 

 nucleus) detached itself with the utmost facility." I shall not 

 pursue the investigation farther than to remark, that, on the 

 1 7th May, my examination gave evidence of the existence of 

 an embryo, and so far corresponded with Keith's observation 

 under the date of June 4. 



My sincere object is, not to point out the progress of the seed 

 of a cherry, or of any other plant, from its first visible formation 

 to its state of maturity ; but, to evince that the seed of a plant 

 may, and does, afford ample evidence, proof positive, that 

 if, de Jacto, bond Jide^ it contain within itself the sum total, 

 the whole, of the future tree ; that is to say, if it comprise all 

 the vessels, cells, tubes, leaves, flowers, and fruits of that 

 tree, whatever may be its ultimate developements and dimen^ 

 sions ; it must contain and comprise these great, these vast 

 dimensions, these products in perpetuo, all within a vesicle ; 

 a mere pin's point of a fluid, as simple, as bland, to all api> 

 pearance, as that of a dewdrop. 



M M 2 



