24^ Of Vegetation. 



which would be the fhorteft and neareft 

 way to convey nourifhment to it 5 but the 

 fingle umbilical veflel, by which the kernel 

 is nourifhed, fetches a compafs round the 

 concave of the ftone, and then enters the 

 kernel near its cone, by which artifice this 

 veffel being much prolonged, the motion of 

 the fap is thereby retarded, and a vifcid 

 nutriment conveyed to the feed, which turns 

 to hard fubftance. 



The like artifice of nature we may obferve 

 in the long capillary fibrous veffels which 

 lie between the green hull, and the 

 hard fliell of the Walnut, which are 

 analogous to the fibrous Mace of Nutmegs, 

 the ends of whofe hairy fibres are inferted 

 into the angles of the furrows in the Walnut- 

 fhell: Their ufe is therefore doubtlefs to 

 carry in thofe long diftinft veffels the very 

 vifcous matter which turns, when dry, to a 

 hard fhell 5 whereas were the fhell immedi- 

 ately nourifhed from the foft pulpous hull 

 that furrounds it, it would certainly be of 

 the fame foft conftitution : The ufe of the 

 hull being only to keep the fhell in a foft 

 duclile fiate till the Nut has done growing. 

 We may obferve the like effecT: of a flower 



motion 



