THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



309 



and that on barren fields, I would say 

 fields comparatively destitute of organic 

 matter, it requires very judicious manage- 

 ment to prevent it from disappointing the 

 purchaser. Other experimenters in this 

 vicinity will probably coincide with me 

 in this opinion. It seems to exhaust the 

 soil at once, and thus leaves the plants 

 with the chances of a precarious exist- 

 ence—first, there is a rapid deposition of 

 tissues, and afterwards as rapid an ab- 

 sorption and disintegration of the succu- 

 lent matter within the meshes of the new- 

 fly formed leaves and stalks, without an 

 •adequate resource to fill its place, and 

 some to spare if the plants be young and 

 thrifty. I am not one of these who look 

 upon the tendency of science to promote 

 the artificial stimulation of animals and 

 vegetables as per se prejudicious — provi- 

 ded the truth be fairly understood and 

 acted upon — that the supply of nutriment 

 must be equal to the demand, neither 

 more nor less : for repletion may as effec- 

 tually thwart our efforts at the improve- 

 ment of races as inanition. The educa- 

 tion of a child may terminate in disease 

 or death by overtaxing its powers, while a 

 judicious exercise of its bodily and men- 

 tal functions may result in health and 

 happiness. 



The decay of families in the higher 

 ranks of society, and the potato rot, I am 

 inclined to attribute to one and the same 

 cause — luxury, or an extravagant stimu- 

 lation of apart of their natural functions, 

 whereby the others are enabled to sup- 

 port the system which gradually sinks. 

 Consumption in animals or vegetables is 

 a penalty for living too fast ; it is more 

 generally the fault of our predecessors ; 

 but such is the decree and we must sub- 

 mit. If its occurrence is but seldom among 

 the more temperate races of men, or in 

 those esculents which are raised in virgin 

 soil and in primitive fashion, there is rea- 

 son to believe that it is because they have 

 not been so highly developed by artificial 

 stimulations. There are epidemics which 

 sweep over extensive countries, prostra- 

 ting at one time the human race, at an- 

 other time cattle, and at another some spe- 

 cies of plant peculiarly sensitive to their 



virulence ; and the potato disease may be 

 considered by some a visitation of Provi- 

 dence of this nature ; but when we re- 

 flect upon ihe injudicious use of excitants 

 in these latter days; and that it is not 

 merely the animal or vegetable immedi- 

 ately concerned which suffers, but the 

 succeeding generation ; we may infer that 

 the appointed time will arrive, however 

 long delayed, when a continued system of 

 abuse or mat practice will bring its reward 

 in the annihilation of certain races and 

 the commencement of others in their 

 stead — a law of nature which will not al- 

 low any simultaneous disappearance of 

 living beings to the endangerment of her 

 whole economy, but replaces a lower 

 family by one higher in the scale, thus 

 making her creative efforts always pro- 

 gressive in the long run. From the re- 

 cords of the past it would seem as if a 

 portion at least, if not the whole race of 

 certain animals and vegetables, must die 

 out before other kinds start into life — the 

 former being instrumental, directly and in- 

 directly, in organizing germs of a supe- 

 rior order of being. I do not mean that 

 the forces which were brought to bear up- 

 on the new comers and ushered them into 

 immediate existence, were derived exclu- 

 sively from their immediate parents, for 

 the physical changes which must con- 

 stantly occur during a long course of 

 ages, may well be considered capable of 

 modifying types and introducing forms 

 which may correspond with the changes 

 alluded to. As then new genera and 

 species may be traced through gradual 

 changes in their organization to assume 

 at length a totally different character, and 

 to struggle with their progenitors as it 

 were for an ephemeral existence, so the 

 vegetable and animal tissues all origina- 

 ting from the globule or cell, after receiv- 

 ing en passant a taint or suspicion of simi- 

 larity, proceed in their journey of life to 

 higher offices, and present the most di- 

 versified textures. The operations, how- 

 ever, of nature always preserve an analo- 

 gy, and we find that these advances are 

 attended with contemporaneous retro- 

 grade movements on the part of other or- 

 ganized tissues or organizable materials. 



