By Thomas Andrew Knight, Esq. 241 



ing evidence of the truth of an opinion, which I gave many 

 years ago in the Transactions of the Horticultural Society* 

 that every leaf, even the most distant, of a Melon-plant, con- 

 tributes to feed its fruit. One of my plants exhibited ap- 

 pearances which led me to conclude that a fruit was set, and 

 was swelling rapidly upon it. My gardener, on the contrary, 

 was very positive that no such fruit existed ; and having 

 myself searched in vain to find it, I was compelled to relin- 

 quish my opinion ; this however I resumed upon observing 

 the habit of the plant two days afterwards, when I ordered the 

 lights to be taken off, and every branch to be minutely exa- 

 mined ; it was then discovered, that a Melon, at the ex- 

 tremity of a straggling branch, had fallen through the trellis, 

 and was hanging half a yard below it. In this situation, it 

 had been entirely shaded by the crowded foliage of another 

 plant ; but nevertheless it had grown in less than fourteen 

 days to be nearly a foot long, and it weighed at least four 

 pounds. That it had derived the material necessary to its 

 rapid growth from the sap of the parent plant cannot, I 

 think, be doubted : and the evidence that the most distant 

 part of the plant contributed to feed it, is certainly extremely 

 strong ; for the fruit grew at the distance of at least six feet 

 from those parts of the plant, which led me to infer its 

 existence. 



By what means the sap generated in the distant foliage, 

 was carried to this fruit in sufficient quantity, is a very inte- 

 resting question to the physiologist, and not less so to the 

 scientific gardener. 



I have at different periods made an immense variety of 



* Vol. i. page 223. 



