*34 
VEGETABLE STRUCTURE. 
lx the Bud for the Eicceedlng year, a very good eye may trace fome 
Rudiment of the minute future Plant j and powerful Glalfes fliew it more 
diftindtly : but in the third Bud fcarce any thing is feen. 
After a time the Seed-Veffel enlarges; and the Receptacle growing 
up in length, becomes a kind of Stalk: the inner Films, which furround- 
ed that and the Flower, alfo grow up into Leaves ; fee Fig. 7 : and thofe 
who would have at frft fuppofed the Plant produced Flowers without Seeds, 
wojld in this Hate of it imagine, that it ripened Seeds with no preceding 
Flowers, the time being fo diftant ; and no appearance of the one accom- 
panying the other. 
It is a quedion of importance, where refides the Vegetative Soul, or 
Principle of Life in Plants : we have allotted it, in general, to the FleOi of 
the Plant ; and examples are to prove this. Where there are fo few parts, 
as in this, we fliall be mod likely to find the certainty. 
The Seat of Life here is not in the folid Blub; for that produces no- 
thing : and is a mere refervoir of nourifiiment : it is not in the Flowering 
Shoot, for that confifis of perifiiablc Films : nor is it in the Fibres, for they 
will decay, and yet the Root will grow. 
It is therefore, and it can be, only in that thin yellowifii callous head 
of the Root, which fends out the Fibres from below, and from which, 
above, the flefliy bafe of the Receptacle rifes. 
This always lives, and remains, fo long as there is a power of Vege- 
tation in the Plant : this is continued under the bafe of the Placenta, 
wl'iich is called the Bulb ; and from the other parts of this thin head are 
fent up Buds, whofe feveral fubdances terminate in young Plants ; and 
which piercing, by peculiar Roots, the fubdance of the Placenta, draw 
their fird nourifiiment from thence ; and afterwards fend out Fibres. 
In this thin head of the Root, we may didincftly fee, by the IVl icrofeope, 
all the feven condituent fubdanccs of Plants, and we may fee them alfo in 
the Fibres. In the upper growth, the two Rinds make the Films and 
Leaves; and the Blea, with all the red, rile, as ufual, to the Pdower. 
The Principle of Life is a plain, fimple, flefiiy fubdance; perfedly 
uniform, and covered by its proper Coats: from this rifes upward, a flefiiy 
bafe, lefs folid than the Root ; but of its nature, and with all its coverings : 
from that a Receptacle rifes, like the fird, but yet more fpungy; and this 
forms at its top a Seed-Veflel and Seeds ; all of the continued fubdances ; 
which no Stalk fupports, nor no Bark covers. The body of a Flower rifes 
round it, formed of the thin Blea ; and the male parts grow from this, as the 
Styles, 
