Juno I, ISO."),] Supptemrnt to IM u Tropical Agriculturist," 
351 
THE UNITY OF PRINCIPLE IN THE 
VEGETABLE KINGDOM. 
[The following is a synopsis of the lecture on the 
above subject delivered by Dr. Lisboa Pinto to the 
students of the School of Agriculture. We regret 
that there was no reporter present on the occa- 
sion on which the lecture was delivered. As may 
be gathered from the meagre notes which we have 
persuaded Dr. Pinto to allow such to reprint, the 
lecture was a most interesting and instructive one, 
and Dr. Pinto was accorded a hearty vote of 
t hanks not only for his able address, but also for 
the kindly interest which he evinced in our agri- 
cultural students by consenting to address them 
in spite of the great demands which the duties of 
a professional man make on his time. — Ed.] 
We should look down upon the great system of 
vegetable life from the loftiest standpoint. Such 
a view not only tends to simplify the study of that 
beautiful Science— Botany— but also elevates man 
in his own estimation and raises him to his true 
dignity as the noblest of beings inhabiting this 
earth. 
There are numberless isolated and apparently 
trifling facts in Botany, but they all become very 
simple and easy of comprehension when we see 
the great principle of unity which pervades the 
whole vegetable creation. 
The great principle is like the small wave raised 
by a stone thrown into a lake. The successive 
circles which rise around it represent the corollaries 
which follow from the great principle, and al- 
though in the recesses or the prominences of the 
coast" the circle appears to be broken up, yet it is 
a circle all the same, &c, &c 
Nature is the book for the true botanist. Be- 
tween a book botanist and a botanist in the field 
the difference is even greater than between the 
man who knows a piano only from a verbal des- 
cription of it and the one who has seen the instru- 
ment a dozen times, &c. 
1. All plant* are similar at some period of their 
existence. — The Protococcus (1 cell), the Oscillatoria 
fa thread of cohering cells), the Mushroom, and 
the developed plant"' 
The prototype of all vegetable growth is a cell; 
or every plant is at first a cell. 
The principle applies throughout : -The Capitu- 
lum is an undeveloped spike ; the latter an un- 
developed raceme &c. Entire, Toothed, LobedimA 
Compound leaf. Orthotropous and Campylotropous 
Ovule. 
2. All vegetables increase bg developing in a cen- 
trifugal manner. A tree with its trunk, branches, 
twigs, leaflets, &C, is like the Solar System. Every- 
thing proceeds from a centre outwards. The 
principle applies to oppodte, alternate, verticillate 
leaves kc. Also to I lie parts of a flower. Put a 
pin through the vary ami you will find that all 
the structures are around it. 
.">. The Unity between all members of a pUint.— 
A root ami Stem are much alike. Also a item and 
bud. A flower-l)ll(l and leal-bud. Buds ami leaves 
also. And between the stem and leaves there is a 
wonderful uniformity. A II >wer isonly a stunted 
axis with its leaves. Tin' flower and inil irescence 
from an ornamental point of view are quite allied: — 
The panicle is contracted into a thyrsus, this into 
a raceme, the racene into an umbel, and t his into a 
oapitulum. 
4- Unity from classification. — There are thou- 
sands of known plants : yet the varieties of a 
species are almost exactly ( lie same in construc- 
tion, form, &c, e.g., the Bandahai, Shoe/lower and 
Sooriya. 
Species, through their affinities resolve into 
Genera. Two children of the same parents, one 
dark, the other fair: one sharp, the other dull. 
Genera arrange themselves into Orders, e.g., 
Cruciferae &c. Orders group themselves into sub- 
classes and cla-ssses, e.g., Lhalamifiorae kc. 
5. Unity in the arrangement of p:trts of plants, 
e.g., alternate, opposite leaves, &C. The arrange- 
ment of flowers, of bracts, of buds, always corre- 
sponding in the different species and genera. 
6. Unity in the habits of plants, e.g., prone- 
ness to grow together, like the social man, as seen 
in connate leaf, gamosepalous calyx, syncarpous 
ovary. 
Also a sessile leaf becomes perfoliate. Stipules 
become ochreate; carpels grow together. Pecu- 
liarity of twining as seen in tendrils, leave}, peti- 
oles, &c. Wing-like expansions in the petiole, 
seed, &c. Some parts become succulent as in the 
cashew, orange, raspberry, pomogranate, pineapple, 
7. Unity in relation to the world. — Plants ad- 
minister to the wants of animals, they are the 
flesh formers. A tiger feeding upon an animal and 
a child at the breast like the herbivora &c. 
From plants we get ornament, timber, shelter, 
food, perfumes, relishes, medicines, &c. 
Plants purify the atmosphere. 
By decomposing they form new earth. 
8. The artistic phase of plants. — The thousands 
of colours produce in us three kinds of impres- 
sions kc. 
9. The poetry of plants. — The language of 
flowers and plants. 
TROPICAL FODDER GRASSES. 
Leersia hexandra, Sw. — " Rice-grass. A wide- 
ly distributed perennial swamp-grass found in the 
warm regions of both hemispheres. It has a 
somewhat slender stem, 2 to -1 feet long, with 
narrow leaves and panicled spikes. In the 
Philippine Islands this grass is regularly cultivated 
under the name of Zacate, for the purpose of 
supplyiug food for domestic animals. It is treated 
like rice, being transplanted to wet and previously 
ploughed meadows. Bailey found it to be one 
of the most relished by cattle amongst the aquatic 
grasses of East Australia. In Singapore it is 
regularly gathered in waste places as a green 
fodder for cattle and horses. 
Panicum Colonura, L. — An annual yeas*, widely 
distributed throughout tropical countries. It pre- 
fers a rich soil, and is often found as a weed of 
cultivation. In some parts of India it is culti- 
vated for its grain. The straw is much used in 
the Madras Presidency and in Mysoie as cattle 
fodder. Dulhie gives the following account of 
this grass (Fodder Grasses of Northern India. 
p. 5;:— 
" It is generally considered to he one of the 
best kinds of fodder ^ra-s. It i s abundant all 
over the plains, and ascends to some few thousand 
feet on the Himalayas. Il is greedily eaten by 
all kinds of cat lb- both before and after it h'OS 
flowered, the abundant crop of grain yielded by 
