The Book Of Curiosities Part 34

The Pekoe is a particular kind of tea-shrub, the leaves of which are all black on the one side, and all white on the other. As the real Pekoe tea is very scarce and dear, the Chinese adulterate it, by mixing with it some of the small half-grown leaves, as yet white, which grow on the top of the common Bohea tea. This changes the quality of the Pekoe, for these leaves being scarcely formed, can have very little sap or flavour.

_Green Teas._--Green teas do not grow in the same place as the Bohea tea.

They are brought from the province of Nankin, and are distinguished into three sorts. The first is known under the name of _songlo tea_, but oftener under that of green toukay; the second is called _bing tea_; and the third _hayssuen tea_, or hyson. There are also some other kinds, but the greater part of them are unknown, or of little importance to foreigners.

The songlo and hayssuen teas come from the same shrub; their only difference is in the manner of their being prepared. Bing tea grows on a different shrub, the leaves of which are thicker and larger than those of other kinds. All teas ought to have a green leaden tint: the older they are, the leaves become more yellow, which is a very great fault. They ought also to have a burnt or scorched smell, not too strong, but agreeable; for when they have been long kept, they have a filthy smell, somewhat like that of pilchards. The French wish to find in green teas, and particularly in songlo and imperial, an odour similar to that of soap.

In these several kinds of tea, there is a particular distinction to be made, as they are generally cla.s.sed into one, two, or three kinds, according to the periods at which they were gathered.

ANTIQUITY OF SUGAR.--From the few remains of the Grecian and Roman authors which have survived the ravages of time, we can find no proof that the juice of the sugar-cane was known at a very early period. There can be no doubt, however, that in those countries where it was indigenous, its value was not long concealed. It is not improbable that it was known to the ancient Jews; for there is some reason to suppose, that the Hebrew word, which occurs frequently in the Old Testament, and which is by our translators rendered sometimes _calamus_, and sometimes _sweet-cane_, does in fact mean the sugar-cane. The sugar-cane was first made known to the western parts of the world, by the conquest of Alexander the Great. Strabo relates, that Nearchus's admiral found it in the East Indies, A. C. 325.

It is evidently alluded to in a fragment of Theophrastus, preserved in Photius. Varro, who lived A. C. 68. describes it in a fragment quoted by Isidorus, as a fluid pressed from reeds of a large size, which was sweeter than honey. Dioscorides, about A. C. 35, says, "that there is a kind of honey called _saccharon_, which is found in India and Arabia Felix. It has the appearance of salt, and is brittle when chewed. If dissolved in water, it is beneficial to the bowels and stomach, is useful in diseases of the bladder and kidneys, and, when sprinkled on the eye, removes those substances that obscure the sight." This is the first account we have of its medicinal qualities. Galen often prescribed it as a medicine. Lucan relates, that an Oriental nation in alliance with Pompey used the juice of the cane as a common drink. Pliny says it was produced in Arabia and India, but that the best came from the latter country. It is also mentioned by Arrian, in his _Petiplus_ of the Red Sea, by the name of [Greek: Sachar] (_sachar_) as an article of commerce from India to the Red Sea. aelian, Tertullian, and Alexander Aphrodisaeus, mention it as a species of _honey_ procured from canes.

CURIOUS EFFECTS OF CINCHONA, or PERUVIAN BARK.--An account has been published in the _Journal de Pharmacie_, for May 1819, of some curious effects produced by Peruvian Bark. A French merchant, M. Delpech, residing at Guayra, in the Caraccas, had stored up a large quant.i.ty of fresh cinchona, in apartments which were afterwards required for the reception of some travellers as guests. These apartments contained each eight or ten thousand pounds of bark; and in consequence of its fermentation, the heat was much greater here than in the other parts of the house, rendering the place somewhat disagreeable. One of the beds placed in these rooms, was occupied by a traveller, ill of a malignant fever: after the first day he found himself much better, though he had taken no medicine; in a few days he felt himself quite recovered, without any medical treatment whatsoever. This unexpected success induced M.

Delpech to make some other trials: several persons ill of fever, were placed successively in his magazine of cinchona, and they were all speedily cured, simply by the effluvia of the bark.

It happened that a bale of coffee, and some common French brandy, were kept in the same place for some months: one of the brandy bottles happened to be uncorked, and, on examination, was found to possess a slight aromatic taste, to be more tonic, and very superior to common brandy. The coffee was also much altered; when roasted, it was more bitter than common coffee, and left in the mouth a taste similar to that of an infusion of bark.

It is to be observed, that the bark which produced all these effects was fresh; and the question whether that of commerce would produce the same effects can only be answered by experiment.

CURIOUS PARTICULARS OF A POUND WEIGHT OF COTTON-WOOL.--The wool came from the East Indies to London; from London it went to Manchester, where it was manufactured into yarn; from Manchester it was sent to Paisley, where it was woven; it was then sent to Ayrs.h.i.+re, where it was tamboured; it came back to Paisley, and was there veined; afterwards it was sent to Dumbarton, where it was hand-sewed, and again brought to Paisley, whence it was sent to Renfrew to be bleached; and was returned to Paisley, whence it went to Glasgow and was finished; and from Glasgow was sent per coach to London. The time taken to bring this article to market was three years, from the time it was packed in India, till the time it arrived in cloth at the merchant's warehouse in London; when it must have been conveyed 5000 miles by sea, and 920 by land, and contributed to support no less than 150 people, by which the value had been increased 2000 per cent.--Thus, from materials of little value in their native state, do arts and manufactures administer to individual comfort and national revenue.

We shall close this chapter with an account of two curious articles, not strictly vegetable, denominated the animated stalk, and the animal flower.

THE ANIMATED STALK.--This very remarkable animal was found by Mr. Ives, at Cuddalore, and he mentions several kinds of it: some appearing like dry straws tied together, others like gra.s.s; some have bodies much larger than others, with the addition of two scaly imperfect wings; their neck is no bigger than a pin, but twice as long as their body; their heads are like those of a hare, and their eyes vertical and very brisk. They live upon flies, and catch these insects very dexterously with the two fore feet, which they keep doubled up in three parts, close to their head, and dart out very quick on the approach of their prey; and when they have caught it, they eat it very voraciously, holding it in the same manner as a squirrel does its food. On the outer joints of the fore feet are several very sharp hooks, for the easier catching and holding of their prey; while, with the other feet, which are four in number, they take hold of trees, or any other thing, the better to surprise whatever they lie in wait for. They drink like a horse, putting their mouths into the water.

Their excrements, which are very white, are almost as large as the body of the animal, and, as the natives say, dangerous to the eyes.

THE ANIMAL FLOWER.--Animal flower, in zoology, is a name given to several species of animals belonging to the genus of Actinia of Linnaeus. They have likewise been distinguished by the names of _Urtica marina_, or _Sea-nettle_, and _Sea-anemone_, from their claws or tentacles being disposed in regular circles, and tinged with a variety of bright lively colours, resembling the petals of some of our most beautiful flowers. As to one species particularly, mentioned by Abbe Diequemarre, in the Phil.

Trans. for 1773, article 37, the purest white, carmine, and ultramarine, are said to be scarcely sufficient to express their brilliancy. The bodies of some of them are hemispherical, of others cylindrical, and others are shaped like a fig. Their substance likewise differs: some are stiff and gelatinous, others fleshy and muscular; but all of them are capable of altering their figure, when they extend their bodies and claws in search of food. They are found in many of the rocky coasts of the West India Islands, and likewise on some parts of the coast of England. They have only one opening, which is the centre of the uppermost part of the animal; round this are placed rows of fleshy claws; this opening is the mouth of the animal, and is capable of great extension. The animals themselves, though exceedingly voracious, will bear long fasting. They may be preserved alive a whole year, or perhaps longer, in a vessel of sea water, without any visible food; but, when food is presented, one of them will successively devour two muscles in their sh.e.l.ls, or even swallow a whole crab as large as a hen's egg. In a day or two the crab-sh.e.l.l is voided at the mouth, perfectly cleared of all the meat. The muscle-sh.e.l.ls are likewise discharged whole, with the two sh.e.l.ls joined together, but entirely empty, so that not the least particle of fish is to be perceived on opening them. An anemone of one species, will even swallow an individual of another species; but, after retaining it ten or twelve hours, will throw it up alive and uninjured. Through this opening also, it produces its young ones alive, already furnished with little claws, which, as soon as they fix themselves, they begin to extend in search of food.

In Hughes's Natural History of Barbadoes, an account is also given of several species of animal flowers. They are described as only found in a bason in one particular cave; and of the most remarkable species mentioned by him, we have the following description:--"In the middle of the bason, there is a fixed stone or rock, which is always under water. Round its sides, at different depths, seldom exceeding eighteen inches, are seen at all times of the year, issuing out of little holes, certain substances that have the appearance of fine radiated flowers, of a pale yellow or a bright straw colour, slightly tinged with green, having a circular border of thick-set petals, about the size of, and much resembling those of a single garden marigold, except that this seeming flower is narrower at the discus, or setting on of the leaves, than any flower of that kind. I have attempted to pluck one of these from the rock, to which they are always fixed, but never could effect it; for as soon as my fingers came within two or three inches of it, it would immediately contract close together its yellow border, and shrink back into the hole of the rock; but, if left undisturbed for about four minutes, it would come gradually in sight, expanding, though at first very cautiously, its seeming leaves, till at last it appeared in its former bloom. However, it would again recoil with a surprising quickness, when my hand came within a small distance of it.

Having tried the same experiment by attempting to touch it with my cane, and a small slender rod, the effect was the same. Though I could not by any means contrive to take or pluck from the rock one of these animals entire, yet I once cut off (with a knife, which I had held for a long time out of sight, near the mouth of a hole out of which one of these animals appeared) two of these seeming leaves. These, when out of the water, retained their shape and colour, but, being composed of a membrane-like substance surprisingly thin, it soon shrivelled up and decayed."

The Abbe Diequemarre, by many curious, though cruel experiments, related in the Phil. Trans. for 1773, has shewn, that these animals possess, in a most extraordinary degree, the power of reproduction, so that scarce any thing more is necessary to produce as many sea anemones as we please, than to cut a single one into as many pieces. A sea anemone being cut in two by a section through the body, that part where the limbs and mouth are placed, ate a piece of a muscle, offered to it soon after the operation, and continued to feed and grow daily for three months after. The food sometimes pa.s.sed through the animal, but was generally thrown up again, considerably changed, as in the perfect sea anemone. In about two months, two rows of limbs were perceived growing out of the part where the incision was made. On offering food to this new mouth, it was laid hold of, eaten, and, the limbs continually increasing, the animal gradually became as perfect as those which had never been cut. In some instances, however, he found that when one of these creatures was cut through, new limbs would be produced from the cut place, those at the mouth remaining as before; so that a monstrous animal was the consequence, having two mouths, and feeding at both ends.

Having put some of them into a pan of water, set over a slow fire, he found that they lost their life at fifty degrees of Reaumur's thermometer.

To avoid the imputation of cruelty in these experiments, the author argues the favourable consequences that have attended his operations on the sea anemones, which have been so fortunate as to fall into his hands: as he has not only multiplied their existence, but also renewed their youth, "which last," he adds, "is surely no small advantage." The reproductive power of the Barbadoes animal flower is prodigious. Many people coming to see these strange creatures, and occasioning some inconvenience to a person through whose grounds they were obliged to pa.s.s, he resolved to destroy the objects of their curiosity; and, that he might do so effectually, he caused all the holes out of which they appeared, to be carefully bored and drilled with an iron instrument, so that we cannot suppose but their bodies must have been entirely crushed to a pulp: nevertheless, they again appeared in a few weeks, from the very same places.

Animal flowers are found in as great beauty and variety on the coast of Galloway, as any where in the West Indies. They are repeatedly taken notice of in Sir J. Sinclair's Statistical Account of Scotland. Mr.

Little, minister of Colvend, mentions the polypus, or sea anemone, among the productions of that coast. Mr. Muirhead, minister of Urr, gives the following particular description of them:--"About five years ago, I discovered in the parish of Colvend, the animal flower, in as great perfection and variety as it is in Jamaica. The lively colours, and the various and elegant forms of the polypus on this coast, are truly equal to any thing related by natural historians, respecting the sea-flowers of any other country. To see a flower of purple, of green, blue, yellow, &c.

striving to catch a worm, is really amusing." And Mr. Marshall, minister of Brittle, has allotted a section of his Statistical Account of his parish, to animal flowers; wherein he says, "Till of late perhaps it has not been much adverted to, that the animal flower, or water polypus, is even common along the sh.o.r.es of Brittle, Colvend, and very likely round the whole coast of the stewartry of Galloway. The form of these polypi is elegant, and pleasantly diversified. Some are found resembling the sunflower, some the hundred-leaved rose, but the greater number bear the likeness of the poppy. The colours differ as much as the form. Sometimes the animal flower is of a deep purple, frequently of a rose colour, but mostly of a light red or fleshy hue. The most beautiful of them, that could be picked up, have often been carried from the sh.o.r.e of Colvend, twelve or fifteen miles up into the country, where they have lived, fed on worms, and even bred for several weeks, and might have existed much longer, if they could have been supplied with sea-water."

CHAP. x.x.xVI.

CURIOSITIES RESPECTING VEGETABLES.--(_Concluded._)

If to this lower planet we advert, Seat of our birth and nurture, proofs abound Of infinite contrivance, matchless skill.

Whether the site or figure we regard, Or distribution of the various parts Perfective of the system, strokes appear Too exquisite for bungling _chance_ to hit.

_Bally._

FUNGUS, OR MUSHROOM.

By fungus, we mean the mushroom tribe. The ancients called them _the children of the earth_, to indicate the obscurity of their origin. The moderns have likewise been at a loss in what rank to place them; some referring them to the animal, some to the vegetable, and others to the mineral kingdom. Messrs. Wilck and Minchausen, have not scrupled to rank these bodies among animal productions; because, when fragments of them or their seeds were macerated in water, these gentlemen perceived a quant.i.ty of animalcules discharged, which they supposed capable of being changed into the same substance. It was an ancient opinion, that _beef could produce bees_; but it was reserved for Messrs. Wilck and Minchausen, to suppose that _bees could produce beef_. The former a.s.serts, that fungi consist of innumerable cavities, each inhabited by a polype; and he does not hesitate to ascribe the formation of them to their inhabitants, in the same way as it has been said that the coral, the lichen, and the mucor, were formed. Hedwig has lately shewn how ill-founded this opinion is with respect to the lichen; and M. Durande has demonstrated its falsity with regard to the corallines.

"Indeed, (says M. Bonnet, speaking of the animality of fungi,) nothing but the rage for paradox could induce any one to publish such a fable; and I regret that posterity will be able to reproach our times with it.

Observation and experiment should enable us to overcome the prejudices of modern philosophy, now that those of the ancient have disappeared and are forgotten." It cannot be denied, that the mushroom is one of the most perishable of all plants, and it is therefore the most favourable for the generation of insects. Considering the quickness of its growth, it must be furnished with the power of copious absorption; the extremity of its vessels must be more dilated than in other plants. Its root seems, in many cases, to be merely intended for its support; for some species grow upon stones, or moveable sand, from which it is impossible they can draw much nourishment. We must therefore suppose, that it is chiefly by the stalk that they absorb. These stalks grow in a moist and tainted air, in which float mult.i.tudes of eggs, so small, that the very insects they produce are with difficulty seen by the microscope. These eggs may be compared to the particles of the byssus, 100,000 of which, as M. Gleditsch says, are not equal to one-fourth of a grain.

May we not suppose that a quant.i.ty of such eggs are absorbed by the vessels of the fungus, and that they remain there without any change, till the plant begins to decay? Besides, the eggs may be only deposited on the surface of the plant, or they may exist in water, into which they are thrown for examination. Do not we see that such eggs, dispersed through the air, are hatched in vinegar, in paste, &c. and wherever they find a convenient nidus for their development? Can it be surprising, then, that the corruption of the mushroom should make the water capable of disclosing certain beings that are really foreign to both? It is not more easy to acquiesce in the opinions of those naturalists who place the fungi in the mineral kingdom, because they are found growing on porous stones, thence called _lapides fungarii_; which, however, must be covered with a little earth, and be watered with tepid water, in order to favour the growth.

Such mushrooms are no more the produce of the stone, than the lichen is of the rock to which it adheres, or the moss, of the tree on which it is found.

We have only to observe the growth of mushrooms, to be convinced that this happens by development, and not by addition or combination of parts, as in minerals. The opinion of Boccone, who attributed them to an unctuous matter performing the function of seed, and acquiring extension by apposition of similar parts; and that of Morison, who conceived that they grew spontaneously out of the earth by a certain mixture of salt and sulphur, joined with oils from the dung of quadrupeds; have now no longer any adherents. Fungi are produced, they live, they grow by development; they are exposed to those vicissitudes natural to the different periods of life which characterize living substances; they perish and die; they extract, from the extremity of their vessels, the juices with which they are nourished; they elaborate and a.s.similate them to their own substance: they are, therefore, organized and living beings, and consequently belong to the vegetable kingdom.

But whether they are real plants, or only the production of plants, is still a matter in dispute with the ablest naturalists. Some ancient authors have pretended to discover the seed of mushrooms; but the opinion was never generally received. Petronius, when he is laughing at the ridiculous magnificence of his hero Trimalcio, relates, that he had written to the Indies for the seed of morelle. These productions were generally attributed to the superfluous humidity of rotten wood, or other putrid substances. The opinion took its rise from observing that they grew most copiously in rainy weather. Such was the opinion of Trajus, king of Bauhin, and even of Columna, who, talking of the _peziza_, says, that its substance was more solid and harder, because it did not originate from rotten wood, but from the pituita of the earth. It is not surprising, that, in times when the want of experiment and observation made people believe that insects could be generated by putrefaction, we should find the opinion general, that fungi owed their origin to the putrescence of bodies, or to a viscous humour a.n.a.logous to putridity. Malpighi could not satisfy himself as to the existence of seeds, which other botanists have pretended to discover. He only says, that these plants must have them, or that they perpetuate themselves, and shoot by fragments. Micheli, among the moderns, appears to have employed himself most successfully on this subject. He imagined, that he not only saw the seeds, but even the stamina, as well as the little transparent bodies destined to favour the dissemination and fecundation of these seeds. Before this author, Lister thought he perceived seeds in the _Fungus perosus cra.s.sus magnus_ of John Bauhin: the little round bodies that are found in the pezizae and belvellae, at that time, pa.s.sed for seeds; which did not appear at all probable to Marsigli, considering that the eye, when a.s.sisted with the very best microscopes, could perceive nothing similar in much larger fungi. Indeed, these bodies may be the capsules or covers of the seeds, if they are not the seeds themselves. However this may be, Marsigli, observing that fungi were often without roots or branches, and that they wanted flowers and seeds, the means which nature employs for the production of perfect plants, thought himself warranted in doubting whether these beings could be ranked in the number of vegetables. The doubts of Marsigli prompted him to observe the formation of fungi. Their matrix he called _situs_: he imagined they grew in places where they met with an unctuous matter, composed of oil mixed with nitrous salt, which, by fermentation, produced heat and moisture, and insinuated itself between the fibres of wood; that is, he imagined them the production of a viscous and putrescent humour.

Lancisi, in like manner, considered fungi as owing their existence to the putrefaction of vegetables, and supposed them a disease in the plants; but he imagined "that the fibres of the trees were necessary to their production," as is the case in the formation of galls; and compared them to the warts and other excrescences of the human body. He added, that such fungous vegetable tumors must necessarily a.s.sume various forms and figures, from the fluids which distend the tubes and vessels relaxed by putrescence, from the ductility of the fibres and their direction, and from the action of the air. This opinion has been refuted by the celebrated naturalist M. de Jussieu, in the Memoirs of the Academy of Sciences for 1728. He maintains, that the fungi have a great a.n.a.logy with the lichen, which is allowed to be a vegetable; that, like the lichen, they are divested of stalks, branches, and leaves; that, like it, they grow and are nourished upon the trunks of trees, on pieces of rotten wood, and on all sorts of putrid vegetables; that they resemble the lichen too in the rapidity of their growth, and the facility with which many of them may be dried, and restored to their former figure upon being immersed in water; and lastly, that there is a great similarity in the manner in which their seeds are produced. He affirms, that only the warts and excrescences which grow on animal bodies, and the knots and other tumors that are to be found on trees, can be compared with each other; for they are composed equally of the solid and liquid substance of the plant or animal on which they grow; whereas, the matter of the fungi is not only quite distinct from that of the plants on which they are found, but often entirely similar to the substance of those that spring immediately from the earth.

The organization (says M. de Jussieu) which distinguishes plants and other productions of nature, is visible in the fungi, and the particular organization of each species is constant at all times, and in all places; a circ.u.mstance which could not happen, if there were not an animal reproduction of species, and consequently a multiplication and propagation by seed. This is not, he says, an imaginary supposition, for the seeds may be felt like meal upon mushrooms with gills, especially when they begin to decay; they may be seen with a magnifying gla.s.s, in those that have gills with black margins: and, lastly, says he, botanists can have no doubt that fungi are a distinct cla.s.s of plants; because, by comparing the observations made in different countries, with the figures and descriptions of such as have been engraved, the same genera and the same species are every where found.

Notwithstanding this refutation by M. de Jussieu, another naturalist, M.

de Necker, has lately maintained, in his _Mycitologia_, That the fungi ought to be excluded from the three kingdoms of nature, and be considered as intermediate beings. He has observed, like Marsigli, the matrix of the fungi; and has subst.i.tuted the word _carchte_ (initium faciens) instead of _situs_; imagining that the rudiment of the fungus cannot exist beyond that point in which the development of the filaments of fibrous roots is perceived. He allows, that fungi are nourished and grow like vegetables; but he thinks that they differ very much from them in respect of their origin, structure, nutrition, and rapidity of growth. He says, that the various vessels which compose the organization of vegetables, are not to be found in the fungi, and that they seem entirely composed of cellular substance and bark; so that this simple organization is nothing more than an aggregation of vessels endowed with a common nature, that suck up the moisture in the manner of a sponge; with this difference, that the moisture is a.s.similated into a part of the fungus, and not merely imbibed for nutrition.

Lastly, That the fructification, the only essential part of a vegetable, and which distinguishes it from all other organized bodies, being wanting, fungi cannot be considered as plants. This, he thinks, is confirmed by the constant observation of those people who gather the morelle and the mushroom, and who never find them in the same spots where they had formerly grown. As the generation of fungi (says M. Necker) is always performed when the parenchymatous cellular substance has changed its nature, form, and function, we must conclude that it is the degeneration of that part which produces these bodies.

But if fungi were owing merely to the degeneration of plants, they would be still better ent.i.tled to const.i.tute a new kingdom. They would then be a decomposition, not a new formation, or new bodies. Besides, we cannot deny, that in those bodies which form the limit between the animal and vegetable kingdoms, the organization becomes simple, as the organs destined for nutrition are multiplied; but, as the last in the cla.s.s of insects belongs to the animal kingdom, fungi ought, notwithstanding the simplicity of their organization, still to belong to the vegetable kingdom.

The parenchymatous, or cellular substance, which, as M. Bonnet says, is universally extended, embraces the whole fibrous system, and becomes the princ.i.p.al instrument of growth, must naturally be more abundant in those productions; and this accounts for the rapidity of their enlargement.

Besides, growth, whether slow or rapid, never was employed to determine the presence or absence of the vegetable or animal character. The _draba verma_, which, in a few weeks, shoots, and puts forth its leaves, flowers, and fruit, is not less a plant than the palm. The insect that exists but for a day, is as much an animal, as the elephant that lives for centuries.

As to the seeds of the fungi, it is probable that nature meant to withdraw from our eyes the dissemination of these plants, by making the seeds almost imperceptible; and it is likewise probable, that naturalists have seen nothing but their capsules. Since, however, from the imperfection of our senses, we are unable to perceive these seeds, because those bodies which have been called their seeds, and the fragments or cuttings of the plants themselves, have not produced others of the same species; Nature seems to have reserved for herself the care of disseminating certain plants: it is in vain, for instance, that the botanist sows the dust found in the capsules of the orchis, though every one allows it to be the seed.

But, after all, what are those parts in the fungi casually observed by naturalists, and which they have taken for the parts of fructification?

These are quite distinct from the other parts; and whatever may be their use, they cannot have been formed by the prolongation of the cellular substance, or of the fibres of the tree on which the fungus grows: they are, therefore, owing, like flower and fruit, to the proper organization of the plant. The plants, however, have a particular existence, independent of their putrefying nidus. The gills of certain fungi, which differ essentially from the rest of the plant in their conformation, would be sufficient to authorize this latter opinion. But can putrefaction create an organic substance? Nature undoubtedly disseminates through the air, and over the surface of the earth, innumerable seeds of fungi, as well as eggs of insects. The plant and the animal are excluded, when the nidus, in which they are deposited, or the temperature, is favourable for their development. No fortuitous concourse, either of atoms or fluids, could produce bodies so exquisitely and so regularly organized. It is sufficient, to throw one's eye on the beautiful plates which Schoeffer has published of them, and compare them, by the gla.s.s, with the warts and other excrescences of animals, to be convinced that they have not the same origin. The function of the cellular substance in vegetables must be greatly superior to that in animals, if it could produce any thing but deformities. The greater part of fungi exhibit a configuration much too regular, constant, and uniform, to be the effect of chance or putrefaction. As this form is preserved the same in all places where fungi have been found, it follows, that they contain in themselves the principles of reproduction. They resemble the misletoe, and other parasitic plants, which are perfectly distinct from the trees on which they grow. The fungi, therefore, are organized and living substances,--or true plants.

CHAP. x.x.xVII.

CURIOSITIES RESPECTING STONES.

_The Meteoric Stone--Labrador Stone--Asbestos--Mushroom Stone--The Changeable Stone--A Wonderful Diamond--A Singular Curiosity._

There are more things in heaven and earth Than are dreamt of in our philosophy.

_Shakspeare._