The Botanic Garden, a Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: the Economy of Vegetation

by Erasmus Darwin

NOTE XXXVI … VEGETABLE CIRCULATION.

Buds set in the ground will grow if prevented from bleeding to death by a cement; vegetables require no muscles of locomotion, no stomach or bowels, no general system of veins; they have, 1. Three systems of absorbent vessels; 2. Two pulmonary systems; 3. Arterial systems; 4. Glands; 5. Organs of reproduction; 6. muscles. I. Absorbent system evinced by experiments by coloured absorptions in fig-tree and picris; called air-vessels erroneously; spiral structure of absorbent vessels; retrograde motion of them like the throats of cows. II. Pulmonary arteries in the leaves, and pulmonary veins; no general system of veins shewn by experiment; no heart; the arteries act like the vena portarum of the liver; pulmonary system in the petals of flowers; circulation owing to living irritability; vegetable absorption more powerful than animal, as in vines; not by capillary attraction.