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been obtained that the line between animal and plant existence 

 can hardly be drawn. The greatest of our Microscopists, 

 men with names of world-wide celebrity, have not able to 

 determine where plant life ceases and animal life commences ; 

 whether plants swimming freely in the water were not animals, 

 and whether animals firmly rooted on stones or vegetable 

 matter were not plants. 



Plants are found to be closely allied to animals in structure, 

 organisation, and vital power. They are living bodies ; they 

 are the offspring of beings similar to themselves ; they grow, 

 are endowed with excitability, or the power of being acted on 

 by external stimuli, such as light, heat, &c., impelling them 

 to the exertion of their vegetable power ; they have their 

 periods of infancy, adult age, decay and death. The truth of 

 this you can test with your own Microscope, by procuring 

 some specimens of the lower forms of plant life and placing 

 them under the low power. 



As the present weather is not inviting for a walk to the 

 Warren, or some favourite pond or ditch, armed with net or 

 spoon wherewith to skim the surface of the water for the 

 various scums, which, we so well know, are composed of the 

 myriad forms of beautiful Diatoms and Desmids ; if we can 

 bring home no newt or small frog, in whose fin-like tail and 

 webbed foot, we can view the process of the circulation of the 

 blood (beautifully displayed) ; we can find nearer home, forms 

 of life quite as interesting, giving us as deep an insight into 

 the mighty secrets of the laboratory of Nature. It is well said 

 that "the vegetation which everywhere adorns the surface of 

 the globe, from the moss that covers the weather-worn stone 

 to the cedar that crowns the mountain top, is replete with 

 matter for reflection. That not a flower or leaf that expands 

 beneath the sunlight, but has something of habit, of structure, 

 or of form to arrest the attention." 



Though the origin of one-celled plants, of the laws which 

 cause, as well as govern their reproduction, belongs to the 

 higher walks of science, and is beyond the reach of the 

 humble every-day Microscopist, like myself, the povver of 

 watching their various forms and functions, of being present 

 at some interesting process, as it takes place beneath the eye, 

 is not denied to the youngest tyro amongst us. This we can 

 easily put to the proof, and since, as has been said, it is out 



