MR. FISH’S REJOINDER TO THE EDITOR. 
341 
proofs that the sap regularly descends, or that it is organisable ? ” We 
know that “ facts are stubborn things,” and valuable acquisitions in 
every science, but unfortunately we can refer to few tantamount to 
indubitable proofs in the science of phytology. The operations of the 
vegetable kingdom are placed so much beyond the power of our 
research, that our knowledge of their primary principles of movement 
can only be known by the effects which we see produced ; and these 
effects being frequently ascertained by mutilation upon the living 
plant, this of itself is a circumstance capable of rendering any proofs 
so obtained at best but dubitable. Many circumstances, however, some 
of which I formerly adverted to, render it extremely probable that there 
is a circulation of fluids; and I do not see it impossible, as I stated 
formerly, that the plant, by virtue of its vital principle, should possess 
the power of appropriating the elaborated sap to the expansion or 
formation of what it contained in embryo; but, as to indubitable proofs, 
I lay claim to the possession of none. Such a process is, no doubt, 
wonderful; but it is not a whit more incredible than many natural 
phenomena of a similar nature, which it would be madness to think of 
doubting—such as the formation of a seed from the action of the dust of 
an anther upon the moist summit of the germen, the production of a bird 
from an egg, or the means by which an animal derives its existence. 
But you believe in the partial and occasional sinkings of the sap, and 
I desired to know upon what principle you could account for these 
partial sinkings. These questions of yours, though sufficiently in¬ 
teresting, are no answer to mine. Putting a question to me which I 
am unable to answer, is no satisfactory explanation or confirmation of 
one of your own propositions ; it only leads me, imitating your ex¬ 
ample, to demand the proofs you possess for establishing what you may 
term “the true philosophy” that there is in vegetables—the strange 
anomaly, that while all around in creation is regulated by systems of 
perfect order and design, their operations alone should be accomplished 
partially—-occasionally, in fact, fortuitously. 
Again, you state “ my mind would be steeled proof against the recep¬ 
tion of a contrary doctrine, so long as I believed that the sap is elabo¬ 
rated in, instead of by , the leaves.” You place the words in and by 
conspicuously in italics ; but I have yet to learn the force of the dis¬ 
tinction, more especially as you seem to have lost sight of your own 
definition, as in a following statement you tell me, after referring to 
the ascent of the sap, that it becomes elaborated in the various organs, 
and assimilated to the essential qualities by the action and influence of 
the atmosphere, and the current or currents of it are accelerated or 
retarded according as there are vents for its reception.” Now I do not 
