Now  it  is  evident  that  the  lime  in  the  bones  of  tbe  animal  was
received  from  its  food,  which  being  a  higher  class  of  vegetable
growth,  could  assimilate  only  such  lime  as  had  been  before  many
times  in  organic  form,  and  therefore  is  rendered  capable  ef  enter-
ing the  higher  class  of  plants,  and  of  being  aj^ropriated  instead
of  being  parted  with  as  excretia;  for  plants  do  throw  off  any
material  held  in  solution  by  water,  which  is  not  sufficiently
progressed  to  form  part  of  their  structure.  The  same  truth  will
^ply  to  the  phosphate  of  lime  separated  trom  the  bone,  as  com-


Mxxaaaus  jomamamu  831

pated  with  that  resolliiig  fiom  the  chlor-apfttite  tock  wbioh  has
sot  belbre  fontid  «  plaee  in  otgmio  life.  Tkaft  the  phosphate
neks  of  Estramadnra,  liiat  <tf  Dorer  in  New-Jersey  and  else-
wkenj  DOthwittttaQding  the  &et  that  they  are  composed  of  phos-
phoric acid  and  lime,  and  in  the  same  relative  proportioBS  as  in
the  phosphate  frou  the  bcme,  will  net  fertilise  plants  of  the  higher
elass^nor  will  ihey  eFen  after  treatmest  with  solphuyicacid.  Thus,
notwithstaidiiig  the  fact  that  all  the  phosphate  of  lifiie  found  in
the  bones  of  aoinuUs  and  ebe  where,  caiae  originally  firom  the  rock,
still,  before  it  attained  its  greatest  value  for  agricultural  purposes,
it  must  have  passed  through  that  chain  of  progression  through
which  all  the  primaries  have  passed  through  before  reaching  the
higher  forms  of  organic  life.
