343 
These 216 parts were then reduced, by drying them at 
the temperature of the atmosphere, to 62 parts, which 
afforded, by incineration, 15.78 parts of carbon. At 
the same time that the plants above mentioned were 
put to grow in distilled water, an equal weight of si- 
milar plants was dried and incinerated in the same 
manner, but they yielded only 4O.20 parts of dry ve- 
getable matter, which contained only 10.96 parts of 
carbon ; whence it is concluded, that the plants 
which had grown ten weeks in the open air, and were 
supplied only with distilled water, had acquired 4.82 
parts more carbon than they possessed before the ex- 
periment. 
648. In another instance, M. de Saussure placed 
four beans, weighing 12O grains, to vegetate in pure 
silicious earth contained in a glass capsule. They 
were watered with distilled water, and kept, for three 
months, in a free exposition to the sun and air. 
When taken up green, immediately after flowering, 
they weighed 1642 grains, but were reduced, by de- 
siccation, to 2O2 grains, which afforded 51 grains of 
carbon ; while four similar seeds, of the same weight, 
and dried and carbonized in the same manner, yield- 
ed only twenty-two and a half grains of carbon. 
Hence, says M. de Saussure, the first four beans had 
more than doubled the quantity of carbonaceous 
matter by vegetating in distilled water in the open 
air ; and it cannot be doubted but that this matter 
was derived from the decomposition of carbonic 
acid found in the atmosphere *. 
* Kecherches Chim. p. 50. et seq. 
