CHAP. X.

Of Vegetables or Plants

NEXT to the earth itself, we may consider those that are maintained on its surface; which though they are fastened to it, yet are very distinct from it: and those are the whole tribe of vegetables or plants. These may be divided into three sorts, herbs, shrubs, and trees.

Herbs are those plants, whose stalks are soft, and have nothing woody in them, as grass, sowthistle, and hemlock. Shrubs and trees have all wood in them; but with this difference, that shrubs grow not to the height of trees, and usually spread into branches near the surface of the earth; whereas trees generally shoot up in one great stem or body, and then, at a good distance from the earth, spread into branches; thus, gooseberries and currants, are shrubs; oaks and cherries,

are trees.

Numerous are the works which have been written, especially in later times, on the science of botany, and various systems, or classifications of plants have from time to time been proposed; but the sexual system of Linnæus is at present generally received. This naturalist. has drawn a continued analogy between the vegetable economy and that of the animal; and has derived all his classes, orders, and genera, from the number, situation, and proportion of the parts of fructification. In twenty-four classes, he has comprehended every known genus and species. In considering a plant with a view to its characteristics, or distinguishing features, it is divided by Linnæus into the following parts, making so many outlines, to which the attention of the botanical observer must be directed; 1. Root; 2. Trunk; 3. Leaves; 4. Props 5. Fructification; 6. Inflorescence. 1. The root consists of two parts, the caudex and the radicula. The caudex, or stump, is the body or knob of the root from which the trunk and branches ascend, and the fibrous roots descend, and is either solid, bulbous, or tuberous; solid, as in trees

and other examples; bulbous, as in tulips c. tuberous, as in potatoes, &c. The radicula is the fibrous part of the root, branching from the caudex. 2. The trunk, which includes the branches, is that part which rises immediately from the caudex in either herbaceous, shrubby, or arborescent, and admits of several other distinctions,according to its shape,substance, surface, &c. 3. The leaves are either simple, as those that adhere to the branch singly, or compound, as when several expand from one footstalk. Leaves are farther described by various terms indicative of their form and outline. 4. The props those external parts which strengthen support, or defend, the plants on which they are found, or serve to facilitate some necessary secretion; as the petlious, or footstalk of the leaf; the pedunculus, or footstalk of the flower, the stipula, or husk, that is, the small leaves that generally surround the stalk at its divisions; the cirrhus, or tendril; the pubes, or down; the arma, or defensive weapon, as thorns. 5. The fructification, or mode, of fruitbearing. 6. The inflorescence, or mode by which the flowers are joined to the seveal peduncles.

In plants there is an infinite diversity; some aquire a long succession of ages to bring them to perfection, while others attain their full maturity in a few hours; some are of immense magnitude, while others are of an inferior stature, descending by gradation till they become too minute to be cognizable by the senses. The mighty baobob of Senegal, described by Adanson,whose stem is 75 feet in circumferance, stands a stately monument on the face of the earth for many thousands of years; while the mushroom, which it much resembles in form, springs up in a day, perfects its seeds, and is withered tomorrow; and when we carry our views still farther, into that immense profound of minuteness which has but of late been partly laid open to us by the invention of the microscope; into the class of mosses, which are in some measure cognizable by the naked eye, and still farther into the more minute class of plants denominated mould, which, even in those of the largest species, are too small to have their parts cognizable by the naked eye, and which, when viewed by the best microscopes, discover a series of existences diminish

ing by a regular gradation, like stars in the galaxy under the best telescopes, till they are lost in the infinity of minuteness, leaving every reason to believe, that, could the magnifying powers of our instruments be augmented a thousand fold, we should still find ourselves as far from discovering the termination of this series of infinite diminution as we were at the commencement of our imperfect survey. The world that we see, therefore, seems to be but a very small part of that which exists; our feeble optics are capable of taking in scarcely a point of that universe which surrounds us; and our imperfect understandings can scarcely obtain a glimpse of that infinite power and wisdom which regulates the whole. Among this infinity of objects, however, we can clearly perceive the most perfect regularity and order pervading every part; and that all the operations of nature proceed with invariable steadiness to effect the purposes for which they have been designed.

Thus we see that all animate objects, from the largest that has been discovered on this globe, to the smallest that can