nORTIl t r.Tl RAL SOCIETY OF LOVDOX. 



1^9 



The following Presents were announced j 



Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, Vol. 0. Part 3. from 

 the Society. 



Comptes Hendus, kc. Parts I. 9. 3. 4. prem. Semestr, IS-lO, 

 from the Academy of Sciences of Paris. 



Proceeding's of the American Philosophical Society, No. 8. 

 Vol. 1., and Transactions of the Society, Part 3. Vol. 6. New 

 Series, from the Society at Philadelphia. 



Prodromus Systematis Saturalis resni J'egetabilis, Par. J. Sectio 

 posterior, from the author, M. De CandoUe. 



March 3, 1840. 

 ORDINARY MEETING. 



The following were elected Fellows of the Society ; 



The Lord Walsingham, Merton Hall, Norfolk, and 7, Upper 



Portland Place. 

 Mr. Wm. Gregory, Cirencester. 

 Horatio Kemble, Esq., Piccadillv. 

 Rev. W. L. Rham, Winkfield Rectory, Berks. 



A Paper was read from M. Vilmorin, F.C.M.H.S., on the 

 possibility of improving the races of wild plants by cultivation. 



The author commenced by adverting to the well known fact, 

 that the greatest part of our kitchen garden plants, and especially 

 those which have been brought to the most perfection, are 

 evidently deviations from wild kinds, modified by the skill and 

 labour of man. We are however unacquainted with the means 

 by which this has been effected. 



We cannot tell how the thready tap-roots of some wild plants 

 have been transformed into our bulky kitchen-garden roots ; or 

 how the head of the cabbage has been created ; or by what pro- 

 cess the tapering leaves upon the stalk of the wild cabbage have 

 been agglomerated and compressed into a compact and fleshy 

 mass. We have no modern instances of such changes, but they 

 seem all to have occurred beyond the period of historical records. 

 A few new vegetables indeed have been introduced during the 

 last century ; but they have remained such, or nearly such, as 

 they were originally. Sea- Kale, for instance, the culture of 

 which during the last forty or fifty years has become general 



