Of the Roots of Plants. 
them to the further examination of the curious ob- 
ferver. 
The feed or powder of the fungus purverulentus, or 
puff-ball, when crufhed, appears like fmoak to the naked 
eye, but when examined by one of the greateft magnifiers, 
is found to be infinite numbers of little orange coloured 
globules, fomewhat tranfparent; in another fort the glo¬ 
bules are of a darker colour, each of them having a 
little ftalk or tail, which are evidently fo many minute 
puff-balls d , furnifhed with flalks, to penetrate eafily into 
the ground, and the mifchiefs they do the eyes, is pro¬ 
bably owing to the fharpnefs of thefe ftalks e , which 
prick and wound that tender organ. 
Of the roots of plants. 
H E root is that part of a plant which immediately 
JL imbibes the juices of the earth, and tranfmits them 
to the other parts for nutrition. It confifts of woody 
fibres, covered with bark, more or lefs thick, and arifes 
from a little point in the feed called the radicle. 
We learn by the affiftance of the microfcope, that 
plants confift of different parts, veffels, &c. each of which 
is fuppofed to be the vehicle of a different humour, or 
juice, fecreted from the mafs of fap, which is ccnfidered 
as the common fund of them all. 
I mujft not here omit a curious phenomenon in the na¬ 
tural hiftory of plants, and that is, when the radicle in 
lowing happens to light loweft, it is no wonder the root 
fhould fpread itfelf under ground, and the flem of the 
plant rife up perpendicularly: but when the radicle falls 
uppermoft, by what means it is that it changes its pofi- 
tion, 
r Derham’s Phyf. Theo. p.418. 
d Phil. Tranf. No.284. 
