attractions to yield to those of inferior power; they probably act
rather mechanically, by bringing into contact such principles, and in
such proportions, as will, by their chemical combination, form the
various vegetable products.

CAROLINE.

We may then consider each of these organs as a curiously constructed
apparatus, adapted for the performance of a variety of chemical
processes.

MRS. B.

Exactly so. As long as the plant lives and thrives, the carbon,
hydrogen, and oxygen, (the chief constituents of its immediate
materials,) are so balanced and connected together, that they are not
susceptible of entering into other combinations; but no sooner does
death take place, than this state of equilibrium is destroyed, and new
combinations produced.

EMILY.

But why should death destroy it; for these principles must remain in the
same proportions, and consequently, I should suppose, in the same order
of attractions?

MRS. B.

You must remember, that in the vegetable, as well as in the animal
kingdom, it is by the principle of _life_ that the organs are enabled to
act; when deprived of that agent or stimulus, their power ceases, and an
order of attractions succeeds similar to that which would take place in
mineral or unorganised matter.

EMILY.

It is this new order of attractions, I suppose, that destroys the
organisation of the plant after death; for if the same combinations
still continued to prevail, the plant would always remain in the state
in which it died?

MRS. B.

And that, you know, is never the case; plants may be partially preserved
for some time after death, by drying; but in the natural course of
events they all return to the state of simple elements; a wise and
admirable dispensation of Providence, by which dead plants are rendered
fit to enrich the soil, and become subservient to the nourishment of
living vegetables.

CAROLINE.

But we are talking of the dissolution of plants, before we have examined
them in their living state.

MRS. B.

That is true, my dear. But I wished to give you a general idea of the
nature of vegetation, before we entered into particulars. Besides, it is
not so irrelevant as you suppose to talk of vegetables in their dead
state, since we cannot analyse them without destroying life; and it is
only by hastening to submit them to examination, immediately after they
have ceased to live, that we can anticipate their natural decomposition.
There are two kinds of