RECORD: Darwin, C. R. & Francis Darwin. [1880]. Draft of Movement on plants, folio 47. CUL-DAR65.87r. Edited by John van Wyhe (Darwin Online, http://darwin-online.org.uk/)
REVISION HISTORY: Transcribed by Christine Chua and edited by John van Wyhe 8.2023. RN1
NOTE: See record in the Darwin Online manuscript catalogue, enter its Identifier here. Reproduced with permission of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library and William Huxley Darwin. The volume CUL-DAR65 contains materials for Earthworms, notes, observations, proofs etc. 1880-1881.
Draft in the hand of Ebenezer Norman with corrections by Darwin. The text of the draft corresponds to Movement on plants, pp. 571-2.
47
47
Ch XII
Finally it is impossible not to be struck with the resemblance between the foregoing movements of plants & many of the actions performed unconsciously by the lower animals.* & the foregoing movements of plants. With plants an astonishingly small stimulus suffices; and even with allied species one may be highly sensitive to the slightest continued pressure & another more so to a slight touch.
The habit of movement at certain periods of the day is inherited; & several other points of similitude have been specified. But the most striking point is the localisation of their sensitiveness, and the transmission of an influence from the excited part to another which consequently moves. Yet plants do not of course possess nerves or a central nervous system; & we may infer that with animals such structures in animals serve only for the more perfect transmission of impressions, & orders, and for the more complete intercommunication of the several parts.)
Citation: John van Wyhe, ed. 2002-. The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online. (http://darwin-online.org.uk/)
File last updated 11 October, 2023