comparative heat and cold, till the genial season of spring returns, when they can extend their roots, shoot forth their plumales, raise their footstalks, and unfold their tender leaves with impunity.

We have already observed, that this mode of propagating the species is universal. It belongs to all the various orders of plants, whether herb, shrub, or tree, and whether annual, biennial, or perennial. Some of these species preserve their seed in the pod, through the winter months, and others both produce and scatter their seed in the early part of the vegetating season, so as to give rise to the seedling, or the full grown plant, before the cold weather, which ends the year, has set in. These varieties, in the manner in which the seed is employed, occasion the necessity of varieties, also, in the mode of propagation, which are abundantly curious and admirable. Some seeds are enclosed in shells, others in purses; some are lodged in capsules, some in wooden sheaths; and others, again, are placed deep in the heart of fruit, which serves at once for their protection and nutriment, and, in some instances, perhaps, also for a rich and appropriate manure, as it decays on the surface of the earth.

In speaking of fruit, as the means by which the seed is frequently shielded, I do not forget, that this very fruit forms the food of various animals; and this gives rise to another proof of Creative contrivance; for while the food itself is digested, and affords nourishment to the animal, the seed in many instances is voided uninjured, and perhaps better prepared for vegetation; and it is thus that the Creator has provided for the dissemination of various plants, and even for their transportation to islands, and other localities, which they could not otherwise reach.

This leads me to state, that, if some provision were not made for the dissemination of plants, they would seldom be far removed from the locality of the parent. Contrivances, therefore, for this purpose, were requisite, and they are many and singular. Numerous seeds, for example, are furnished with an elastic pod, which, on burst

ing, projects its contents to a considerable distance. Of this we have a wellknown example in the common furze. Nearly all the seeds of compound flowers are provided with a species of wings, through which means they are conveyed, by the wind, to distant places. The thistle and dandelion are of this kind. Other seeds, as the bur, are scattered abroad, by laying hold of passing animals, by means of hooks; and not only do birds and some quadrupeds perform, as we have stated, an important part in this useful office, by swallowing the seeds contained in berries, but some animals, both of the insect and larger orders, contribute to the same end, by their storing instincts. Nor must we forget the effects of streams and rivers in the accomplishment of this useful intention. So various and so wise are the means by which the Creator accomplishes this beneficent purpose.

To all this, I must add the power, with which the Author of Nature has endowed various seeds, of retaining the vital principle for a lengthened period. Ray mentions, that, after the great fire in London, in 1666, a plant, (sisymbrium iris,) the seeds of which must have lain dormant for several hundred years, covered, to an amazing extent, the walls of the buildings which had been burned.* The seeds which are sometimes discovered

* The following observations on this curious subject, are extracted from a notice in Professor Jameson's Philosophical Journal, for the quarter ending January, 1826. "Spontaneous Plants.-Few things are more extraordinary than the unusual appearance and developement of certain plants, in certain circumstances. Thus, after the great fire in London, in 1666, the entire surface of the destroyed city was covered with such a vast profusion of a species of cruciferous plant, the sisymbrium iris of Linnæus, that it was calculated that the whole of the rest of Europe did not contain so many plants of it. It is also known, that, if a spring of salt water makes its appearance in a spot, even a great distance from the sea, the neighborhood is soon covered with plants peculiar to a maritime locality, which plants, previous to this occurrence, were entire strangers to the country. Again, when a lake happens to dry up, the surface is immediately usurped by a vegetation, which is entirely peculiar, and quite different from that which flourished on its former banks. When certain marshes of Zealand were drained, the carex cyperoides [a kind of coarse grass] was observed in abundance; and it is known, that this is not at all a Danish plant, but peculiar to the north of Germany. In a work upon the Useful Mosses, by

enclosed within the cerements of Egyptian mummies, and which have been found to germinate when lodged in the soil, are another remarkable example. Gerardin mentions other instances of the same kind, and, in particular, one which happened under his own eye, in the Jardin des Plantes,' [Garden of Plants,] all which, shows in seeds a wonderful tenacity of life, doubtless implanted for a wise and obvious purpose. This, indeed, is only another instance of what we have already noticed, that, in the operations of the Author of Nature, there appears to be no intention more apparent, or more sedulously pursued, than that of the preservation and propagation of the various species of organized existences, which his Creative Power has formed. So true is this, that, throughout every department, an inquirer cannot fail to be deeply impressed, at once with the diversity, the admirable adaptation to circumstances, and the efficiency of the contrivances by which the object is effected.

SECOND WEEK-FRIDAY.

LONG VITALITY OF SEEDS.

AFTER writing the preceding paper, I met with some curious observations, by Mr. Jesse, on the long vitality of seeds, which are so appropriate, that I adopt them as the subject of this day's consideration. They will be found to be in perfect harmony with the facts alluded to yesterday, and may perhaps tend to explain some of the

M. de Brebisson, which has been announced for some time, this botanist states, that a pond in the neighborhood of Falain having been rendered dry, during many weeks in the height of summer, the mud, on drying, was immediately and entirely covered, to the extent of many square yards, by a minute compact green turf, formed of an imperceptible moss, (the phaseum axillare,) the stalks of which were so close to each other, that, upon a square inch of this new soil, might be counted more than five thousand individuals of this minute plant, which had never previously been observed in the country."-P. 209, Article Scientific Intelligence.

curious circumstances mentioned in the note extracted from Professor Jameson's Journal.

"Few things appear to me more curious, than the fact, that the seeds of various plants and flowers, which have lain dormant in the ground through a succession of ages, have either, by being exposed to the air, been enabled to vegetate, or to have been brought into action by the application of some compost or manure, agreeable to their nature.

"This was shown in trenching for a plantation at Bushy Park, which had probably been undisturbed by the spade or plough since, and perhaps long before, the reign of Charles I. The ground was turned up in winter, and, in the following summer, it was covered with a profusion of the tree-mignonette, pansy, and wild raspberry,-plants which are no where found in a wild state in the neighborhood ;-and, in a plantation recently made in Richmond Park, a great quantity of the foxglove came up, after some deep trenching. I observed, a few years ago, the same occurrence in a plantation in Devonshire, the surface of which was covered with the darkblue columbine,-a flower produced in our gardens by cultivation, and I believe not known in this country in its wild state. * A field also, which had little or no Dutch clover upon it, was covered with it, after it had been much trampled upon, and fed down by horses; and it is stated, from good authority, that if a pine forest in America were to be cut down, and the ground cultivated, and afterwards allowed to return to a state of nature, it would produce plants quite different from those by which it had been previously occupied.

"So completely, indeed, is the ground impregnated with seeds, that, if earth is brought to the surface, from the lowest depth at which it is found, some vegetable matter will spring from it. I always considered this fact as one of the surprising instances of the power and bounty of Almighty God, who has thus literally filled the earth with His goodness, by storing up a deposit of useful seeds

I have since learned, that the columbine is found wild in the western counties.

in its depths, where they must have lain for a succession of ages, only requiring the energies of man to bring them into action. In boring for water lately, at a spot near Kingston-on-Thames, some earth was brought up from a depth of three hundred and sixty feet. This earth was carefully covered over with a hand-glass, to prevent the possibility of other seeds being deposited upon it; yet, in a short time, plants vegetated from it. If quicklime be put upon land, which, from time immemorial, has produced nothing but heather, the heather will be killed, and white clover will spring up in its place.

"A curious fact was communicated to me, respecting some land which surrounds an old castle, formerly belonging to the Regent Moray, near Moffat. On removing the peat, which is about six or eight inches in thickness, a stratum of soil appears, which is supposed to have been a cultivated garden in the time of the Regent, and from which a variety of flowers and plants spring, some of them little known, even at this time, in Scotland.

"The care which is taken to supply the ground with those seeds, which, from probably being of a farinaceous nature, would not preserve their vital powers through a succession of ages, as other seeds do, is very curious. Many of them are deposited by crows, and other birds and animals. The Rev. Mr. Robinson, in his 'Natural History of Westmoreland and Cumberland,' says that 'birds are natural planters of all sorts of trees, disseminating the kernels upon the earth, till they grow up to their natural strength and perfection.' He tells us, that early one morning he observed a great number of crows, very busy at their work upon a declining ground, of a mossy surface; and that he went out of his way on purpose to view their labor. He then found, that they were planting a grove of oaks.* The manner of their planting was thus-They first made little holes in the earth with their bills, going about and about till the hole was deep enough, and then they dropped in the acorn, and covered it with

* I have observed in another place, that rooks probably bury seeds for the purpose of feeding upon them in winter.-H. D.