of the body a roundish hollow muscle: | the body, where it has received we will call it the heart. It shall have pipes passing from it, which shall divide into smaller ones, and go to every part of the body. The little vessels rising from the intestines, which we will call lacteals, shall bring the nutritive matter, and pour it into the heart. The heart shall contract, and send it through the pipes, to every part of the body. But before this can take place, some previous process is required. The blood received from the stomach must first pass through the lungs, for purposes which will be soon explained. But let us go on as we were going, and our ideas will speedily become cor fresh supply from the stomach; but the old blood is altered in some of its properties, and is utterly unfit for the purposes of life, until it has undergone the action of the air. How shall we contrive this, we find that our single heart is insuffi cient. We must have as it were two hearts:-one shall receive the blood in the state just mentioned, and send it into an apparatus where the air may effect the necessary change in it-the lungs. The other heart shall receive the prepared blood from the lungs and send it for the purpose of nou rishment to every part of the body. The first heart, we have said, shall receive the blood from every part of the body with the fluid of the absorb ents, and send it into an apparatus for giving it air. This apparatus shall be called the lungs. They shall be bellows, and shall be formed of a number of vesicles, membranous blad ders, which shall admit the air, and on which the blood-vessels shall be spread so that the air shall come in contact, or nearly so, with the sides of the vessels which will be found sufficient to pro duce the necessary change in it. When this change has been effected veins shall receive the now perfect blood from all the small arteries of the lungs, and carry it to the second heart which contracting, shall send it anew to every part of the body. This is one circulation. This is the discovery of the immortal Harve after philosophers for many ages been contented with absurd theories the motion of the blood, supposing like the flux and reflux of the tide, so forth. Though we have formed hearts to simplify the circulation we will join them together, as motions may go on at the same we will call the whole, the heart animal; and the two hearts, th sides of the heart. Let us impress it on our m that one side of the heart rec prepared blood from the sends it to nourish the bod others beives the ble ody, and se gain prepare the general strength, and paints vo: and action for te soovn hollow, and full dui. we Structu moveske praks U are two muis-ne pers and ed with sunowa. via savLY creted, and prevented mos Presten by a membranous rivet a the ends of the bones. bnverte bars, pes called: ed to them; and to these pess colae fires are fixed, whicassortentu themselves, draw the mose veable towns the least moveable piece of it the fame the museulaz nes sub servient to the will by means offerves passing from the brain to them. To mite the muscular fibres to in each other, cellular substance is ade use of of which also membraze Bond-ressels, great part of the sto mad and intestines, and of almost ent etary soft part of the body, is formed fal nerves, sent from it to the det Fat also is placed by way of easi The support of the body is de This fluid is taken up by The heart sends it do "The pector, No. 109. wer in this bouquet, was a the fragrance of this led me requently and nearly: the ling was not the only one these occasions; while that with the powerful sweet, - constantly attacked by an ft but agreeable murmurIt was easy to know that within the covert, must ian, aud that the little st come from some little to produce it. I instantly the lower part of the flower, it in a full light, could Cops of little insects friskpering with wild jollity Morrow pedestals that supves, and the little threads ed its centre! I was not h to pull out any one of amination: but adapting e to take in, at one view, se of the flower, I gave pportunity of contemplatey were about, and this vs together, without givlast disturbance. Thus over their economy, their their enjoyments. The this occasion, had given emed to have denied to contemplation. The flower extended itself ence to a vast plain; ms of the leaves became many stately cedars; the middle seemed columns cture, supporting at the Pral ornaments; and the s between were enlarged parterres, and terraces. ished bottom of these, Parian marble, walked ne, or in larger companies, inhabitants: these from flies, (for such only the would have shown them,) ed to glorious glittering aniined with living purple, and glossy gold that would have l the labours of the loom conle in the comparison. I could, ure, as they walked together, adtheir elegant limbs, their velvet lders, and their silken wings; r backs vieing with the empyrean its blue; and their eyes, each formd of a thousand others, out-glittering the little planes on a brilliant; above description, and too great almost for NEW METHOD OF PRESERVING Communicated to the Caledonian Horticultural Society, by the Rev. Anthony Dow, D. D. FOR Some years I have bestowed considerable attention on the mode of preserving that most useful and valuable vegetable, the Potatoe. I have tried many various ways of keeping it, but have found none so good as the following, which I have employed these two last years with the best success. That part of my potatoes which I mean to keep longest, that is, for spring and summer use, before the succeeding crop be ready, I put into small pits, holding about two bolls each, heaped up and covered in the usual mode with straw and earth. In April or May, according to the heat of the season, these potatoes are turned over into other pits; after carefully rubbing off or picking out the shoots or buds, or laying aside every one that has any blemish or tendency to spoil. The evening before the potatoes are removed, a new pit is dug, or an old one cleared out, in some dry spot, and if possible under the shade of some tree, wall, or stack of hay, &c. This is filled nearly full of water, which by next morning is all drunk in, and the earth well cooled all round in the pit. The potatoes, carefully picked of all their shoots, are put into the pit thus prepared; and every quantity, of a firlot or half boll, is watered as it is put in, till the potatoes are level with the surface of the ground; they are then covered with live turf, the green side next the potatoes, and a hearty watering given, when the whole is covered to the depth of two feet with earth, watered, and well beaten together with the spade. This process is repeated every time the potatoes are turned over, which is about once in three weeks, less or more, according to the weather. When it is very hot, and the pits or heaps are not in the shade, it is proper sometimes to cover the pit or heap with a mat, supported on a few sticks, so as to allow a free current of air between the mat and the heap. In this way I have been enabled to preserve potatoes quite plump, and entire in taste, to the end of September, or till the succeeding crop be sufficiently ripe to be used without loss; and loss must always be sustained in the quantity, when potatoes are largely used before they are nearly ripe. Nay, in this way, potatoes may be recovered in plumpness and taste, when they have suffered by injudicious exposure to air or heat, or by necessary carriage. In July last I had occasion to send some potatoes, for the use of my family, at sea-bathing quarters, a distance of sixteen or seventeen miles. They were taken out of the pit, and put into a sack; but it was three or four days before they were sent off; and when they came to be used, they were found to have lost much of their fine taste, and somewhat of their mealiness. immediately made a small pit in the back ground belonging to the house I possessed; into which, when well watered, the potatoes were put, watered and covered, as already described. In five days the pit was opened, and the potatoes had recovered both their dryness and taste. I To the supposition of your author, "that this globe was originally formed in a fluid; that the waters stood very high above its surface; and that the materials of which its crust is composed, were held in chemical solution;" from the Mosaic account of the subject, Sir, I could, if leisure and room permitted, state many insuperable objections. "It is the characteristic feature of the Wernerian Geognosy," he says, "that the earth was formed out of water, and by the agency of water." And he seems to think that both Moses and the apostle Peter declare the same thing. Upon this hypothesis, not yet established or rendered valid by any thing he has proved, he proceeds solemnly to admonish the infidel. Which conduct in him, is certainly not less "ludicrous,' "" than it was in the "learned writers" and "eminent scholars," of whom he speaks, to "commit such lamentable blunders, when they enter these regions of philosophy, without a previous preparation."* Had your author himself previously examined the subject as he ought, he never would have so mistimed his appeals to the conscience of an opposer, nor have founded his admonitions on such doubtful grounds. Had he looked with attention into the Mosaic account, in the Hebrew text, he would have found that Moses is not speaking of water in the state in which it now exists, or even in any state of it; but that he merely makes use of a word which literally signifies plurality or multitude, and which we indeed commonly render water; and applies it to matter in its elementary state: because, in that state, it consisted of a vast multitude of loose, unconnected, and confused particles, constituting what is called a chaos, or mass, "without form and void;" but which, like water or other fluid bodies, admitted readily of motion among its particles. It was out of this mass, I own, that Moses says the universe was made, and not of water in its present state; for at that time neither water nor earth, properly speaking, existed; all that existed was only an elementary state of things. According to the Mosaic account, God commenced the stupendous work of creation, by calling into existence the materials on which he was afterwards to operate, on the first day; but it does not appear that either water or earth, in a strict sense, was produced till the third day. If so, the position of your author on this head, must then fall to the ground. Equally unfounded, I presume, are his observations on the passage in the second epistle of Peter. By strictly examining the subject of which the apostle is treating, it appears that he is not speaking of the creation, at least the modus of its original formation, but of the deluge. His whole discourse is an answer to an objection against the coming of the Lord to judge the world, at a certain future time appointed, drawn by some infidel scoffers of his day, from the apparent permanent and unchangeable state of the world. They concluded that there were no appearances in nature to war* His unnatural and childish exclamations and “ Hallelujahs!” which occur in his subsequent papers, are, if any thing, more "ridiculous," and out of place, still. He appears to me not to be capable of knowing when a thing is proved. No. 13, VOL. II. rant such an expectation; because since the oldest times, since the fathers fell asleep, since the first progenitors of the human race died, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation. No change in nature having hitherto happened to destroy the world, it is altogether unlikely that there ever will be any.-The apostle, in answer to this objection, shews, a fallacy in the foundation on which it is built; and asserts that there had been a change in the mundane system; and that, though of the most public and notorious nature, yet the scoffers were willingly ignorant of it, and kept it on the back ground while they stated their objection; a change which destroyed the old world, and cut off every living thing from the face of the earth. In short, that the whole "being overflowed with water, perished." And to anticipate and remove all objections respecting the possibility of such an event, he shews that the very constitution" of the heavens which were of old by the word or power of God," consisting of waters suspended in the atmosphere; and of the earth, which consisted, as Moses informs us, "of seas," as well as "dry land," and therefore causing some parts to "stand out of the water," and other parts in the water," were equally concerned in it. For according to the emphatic language of Scripture in another place, the windows of heaven were opened, and the fountains of the great deep broken up." It is a certain fact then, as your author declares, (in a note,) “That there was once a period when this earth was entirely covered with water, and that afterwards it emerged from the water, or, what is the same thing, that the water receded from it." And the apos tle here assures us, that this period was at the deluge, and not at the creation; for the creation of the world did not form any part of the objection, since the scoffers admitted the crea tion, ver. 4. and founded their argu ments solely upon the unchangeable appearances of nature from that period till their own times. I am afraid, Sir, your author when he undertook to make the theories of modern Geologists and the Mosaic account agree, proposed to himself a task which he will never be able to perMore form to any good purpose. easily easily may he unite oil and water, or It darkness and light, than the prepos- |mation of the terrene strata; when terous conclusions they sometimes maintain, with the superlatively beautiful and rational account of Moses. And in vain, I fear, does he indulge the hope, that such a union, and such flimsy arguments as can be drawn from it, will ever convince of his error, an unbeliever in the divine record. It perhaps would be otherwise, however, if we would put theory altogether out of the question, and have regard to the facts of Nature and Revelation simply as they stand. Who knows but this might effect what is in vain sought for by the other method? will not be by telling the infidel, that the earth arose originally "out of water;" and that not only the meek man Moses affirms so, but that it is affirmed by the great philosopher Werner, the founder of a new theory, and the inventor of a set of laws which determine with precision the relative dates of the respective strata; and whose system has gained thousands of proselytes. In vain you lead him to the six days' work of creation, according to Moses, and shew him that vegetables were created on the third day, marine animals or fishes on the fifth,-land animals on the sixth,-and lastly, man; and then open to him the bowels of the earth, and bid him take a peep of what is to be seen there. In vain you try to demonstrate that, as vegetables were the first created of organized beings, so they hold the first place above the primitive rocks. That as fishes and marine animals were next produced, so they come next in order in the strata of the earth. That as land animals were formed after the fishes, so they are found exterior to them in the earth's crust. And that as man was last produced, and like one born out of due time, so his situation in the crust of the earth is the very newest alluvial soil. In vain, I say, do you avail yourself of such trifling and paltry coincidences. A thinking mind discerns neither sense nor reason in them. It sees them to be all founded in impossibilities and errors; and to be such a gross kind of mixture, that its union resembles the clay and the iron in Nebuchadnezzar's vision. Moses assures us, on the highest authority, that both were created within a day of each other? If such was the case, where was the time for the distinct formation of the respective strata, unless you adopt the theory of Mr. Macnab, and give an unlimited extension to the six days of Moses, and call them aɩwres, or ages, or periods of unmeasurable duration? But even here, what reason could be traced in such a scheme? Suppose you heard Moses declaring, in the precise language of modern Geologists, That ages, and millions of ages, rolled on, while the earth was bringing forth her luxuriant crops, for no other purpose than to form a carbonaceous stratum. Suppose you heard him maintaining, with Werner and Hutton, that there were myriads of ages, during which the terrene mass underwent various fusions, overflowings, and recessions, sometimes by fire, and sometimes by water, in order to form the primitive and other rocks: or, with Cuvier and Macnab, that there were myriads of revolutions of the seasons, in which the earth spontaneously poured forth her luxuriant productions; "the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after their kind;" vast forests springing up, flourishing, and fading, and repeating the same over and over; and all this before any creatures, ages before, millions of ages before, any creatures were formed to reap the benefit of these productions: yea, that the more noble part of animated nature could not be formed, till the vegetable had existed so long as to compose this so much boasted carbonaceous stratum. And then, afterwards, when in the progress of time this came to be deposited by the slow decomposition of vegetables, animals were formed, but of species which have now become extinct: and, that in order likewise to form a stratum of the remains of these, the same process must go on with the animals that went on with the vegetables, to countless ages. And, to complete the whole, after having got the globe thus richly furnished with marine and vegetable petrifactions, sea shells, and bones of animals, like What, for instance, can be more de- the grotto of a virtuoso, with a first, void of sense, than to quote the Mosaic second, third, fourth, and fifth layer, order of the creation of fishes before to form a firm basis for the soles of his land animals, as an evidence that it feet, he introduces man; man, the corresponds with the order of the for-principal creature of which this world |