272 The Sex and Generative Organs of Plants. 



in the reproduction of vegetables always acts on the same 

 general plan^ and that the process, although from its minute- 

 ness verging on the border of what is not appreciable by 

 our senses, yet never passes it. 



In this respect the sexual antagonism in plants distin- 

 guishes itself from sex in animals. In the animal kingdom, 

 higher mental impulses, such as sensibility, inclination, will, 

 influence sexual intercourse, and the several manifesta- 

 tions do not by any means correspond in their appear- 

 ance with the growth of the animal, but are all along regu- 

 lated by a higher nature, and most intimately connected 

 with mental emotions. On the contrary, the process of 

 reproduction in a vegetable can only be looked on as a 

 peculiar kind of growth. The same impulse, which rules 

 vegetable life in all its other manifestations, that of increas- 

 ing in length and in breadth, also operates from the begin- 

 ning in the production of a plant. In that part, which we 

 compare to the male organ in animals, an unusual activity 

 in growth lengthwise develops itself. The pollen tube, 

 is, in relation to its excessively small diameter, longer than 

 the highest palm tree, or than any tree of the most 

 gigantic proportions. In the ovum, which we regard as 

 the analogue to the female organ in animals, a tendency to 

 growth in breadth develops itself from the beginning, for 

 it deposits one layer of cells round another, and thus in- 

 creases the part in its dimension of breadth, just as the stem 

 or branch of a tree does the same by the deposition of yearly 

 rings. According to this view of the matter, the produc- 

 tion of a seed is nothing but the peculiar union of growth, 

 longitudinally and laterally in the smallest space, and there- 

 fore, so to speak, of little corporeal importance, although 

 accomplished by the highest degree of power and vitality. 

 But the new vegetable life is satisfied with its corporeal 

 endowments, and does not require more occult ones, it 

 begins and ends with corporeal matters. We must never- 



