[page] 255

The Power of Movement in Plants. By Charles Darwin, LL.D., F.R.S. Assisted by Francis Darwin. D. Appleton & Co. $2.00.

Looking over the pages of this book, and noting the labor of observation it must have cost, we cannot help asking the old question, Cui bono? What is the good of it? The author himself seems conscious that it is dry reading, inasmuch as he kindly notifies us that we "need not read all the details," and indeed may, if we "think fit, read the last chapter first, as it contains a summary of the whole volume."

We have followed his advice, and we think we discover here the secret of the volume in such statements as these: "It is impossible not to be struck with the resemblance between these movements of plants, and many actions performed unconsciously by the lower animals" ─"the tip of the radicle thus endowed, and having the power of the movements of the adjoining parts, acts like the brain of one of the lower animals." Well, if plants have a brain, or the equivalent of it, directing all their movements, then we suppose, along the line of evolution, the distance between a squash-vine and Mr. Darwin isn't worth talking about. Is that the direction and the aim of the argument?