18 
with Bacon, to admit nothing that bears not the stamp of trfal and the signet of 
inductive scrutiny; be it mine to accept no theory as valid, that is not the off¬ 
spring of accumulated facts, collected from the roll and register of multiplied and 
diversified experiments ; be it mine never to torture or to twist, lengthen or 
shorten, with the inquisition of a Procrustes, however ingenious may be the 
device and cunning, facts and experiments to suit preconceived whims and 
fancies; be it mine, also, with Newton, to trace the phenomena of the universe of 
being, up to their divine origin and sublime and awful source. 
I cannot, therefore, but rejoice, that, in your prospectus, you have avowed 
yourselves as determined never to forget the dependence of the whole on the one 
Divine Originator. I am sure numbers will join with me, in wishing every suc¬ 
cess to a periodical that comes to us so highly recommended; and I am quite cer¬ 
tain there can be no sound philosophy that does not recognize an intelligent first 
cause, and a prospective and legislative Providence. 
By way of apology for these preliminaries, I beg to communicate, ad inte¬ 
rim , a few miscellanea, as an earnest of something more elaborate for an early 
number. 
I.—Natural Ventilation of Seeds. 
This occurs to me as one among many questions of curious interest in the 
physiology of plants; though I believe it has been entirely overlooked. The 
seed-vessel of the Heart’s-ease is pendent and reversed ; the seeds are ultimately 
naked and exposed till the period for their dispersion arrives, when the seed-vessel 
becomes erect, and adjusts its open valves to imbibe the direct rays of the sun¬ 
beam. In the former case, it is evident that rain could not injure the immature 
seeds, nor moisture lodge within the cavities. In some plants we find the reverse 
of all this, the exception being provided for their peculiar contingencies. The 
Butter-nut, is supplied with an open slit, or natural vent, for the specific 
purpose of ventilation; and there is, also, for the same reason, a circular 
orifice at the apex of the shell that encloses the triangular Brazilian Nuts—a shell 
possessed of adamantine hardness. By this opening atmospheric air, as in the 
former case, gains admission. In the capsules of the Poppy, the ventilating 
orifices are beneath the canopy which crowns them. On both sides of the Hura 
crepitans , or Monkey’s Dinner-bell, there are narrow meshes, or windows, by 
which the air circulates, matures the seeds, and promptly dries up whatever mois¬ 
ture may find an occasional lodgement within the shell; it would, otherwise, 
explode long before the period of maturity supervenes. In the Hernandia 
sonora , or Whistling Jack-in-a-Box, the air winds among the avenues of the 
seeds, there being a round aperture on the summit of the capsule, and the seeds 
occupying only a limited portion of the inner chamber: the tree thus becomes 
