42 
SEKD CF PLANTS. 
I 
Alterations 
■Kitliiu the 
stnii. 
Qiianlity of 
rri|itoy[M>nia 
hot ween tiie 
cyiiiulcrs. 
conveyed through the common root : and that I have again 
detected it at the top of the stem where it enters the flower- 
stalk ; yet I have not discovered the part in which it mounts j 
for the season closed on my labours, before I had time perfectly 
to complete my task. Indeed, in no science is it so necessary to 
continue invariably what has been undertaken ; most studies 
may be pursued or laid by as industry or idleness sugsest ; but 
the phytologist must not lose a day, or the season flies, and he 
has to wait a whole year before he can renew his subject, or 
recover the lost appearance of the specimen he neglected to 
draw ; so quickly also do the pictures succeed each other in 
dissecting. Each separata part, whether of the bark, wood, or 
])ith, is so divided into innumerable cylinders, made to approach- 
or fall back ; between v;hich are admitted the different 
ingredients of the plant, beginning at the interior of the root, 
and so exactly arranged accoiding to the ensuing season, that 
what has been discovered one month will appear to be con- 
tradicted the next ; from the total change which will have taken 
place u ilnin ; if, therefore, the dissecterhas not already learnt, 
that the seasons are to the full as varying in the interior of the 
plant as without, how puzzled he must be ; it is only by tracing 
the repealed changes for many succeeding years, that I have 
been enabled to lay before the public these various discoveries. 
How difliciiU then, how imf)t.issiblt; for a person who dissects 
but a few times in a year, to understand the plan and formation 
of a vegetable. 
I shall now shew the necessity of never admitting any part 
to belong to a plant, that cannot be traced in all its diflerent 
stages. There is a source of deception so likely to inveigle a 
phytologist (,’ukI which was, in truth, the cause of delaying the 
di.icovery now so h-ippily effected) of “ the growth of seeds 
in the root." 1 mean the quantity of criptogamia discovered 
between the rind and bark in every tree or shrub. I shall 
scarcely be credited when I say, that extremely minute fes- 
toons of flowers, apparent branches of fruit, and bunches of 
seeds, appear throughout the year, and are continually found 
between 
