Each group of elements that enters into the composition of any substance, carries with it qualities and capabilities peculiar to itself, throughout the vegetable kingdom. Its influence upon the animal economy will depend on the various atomic elements, and the quantities of each, that enter its combinations. For example, the atmosphere, the balance of power between O and N, is essential to both plant and animal. So with water, O H2. And so with those foods, starch and sugars, C18H30O15 or C6 H12O6; in each of these substances Carbon has its complement of Hydrogen and Oxygen. That is, the Carbon is, as it were, diluted in a sufficient quantity of water to make it suitable for food. Rob it of its Oxygen and it becomes a poison, an active poison. The less the quantity of Oxygen in any substance of organic origin the more unfit it becomes as a food. And it becomes poisonous to the animal system in proportion as the Oxygen is absent or removed from the composition. We have representatives of poisonous substances in alcohol, C2H6O, a mild poison; and in hydrocyanic acid, C N H, the strongest poison known. Moreover, we see already peculiar manifestations in vegetable life, humble in character, low in degree. Plants not only rest from activity, but have their sleep and exhibit sensible movement from irritation. The foliage of the locust, and of most leguminous plants, and that of oxalis and wood-sorrel, seem to have their sleep, as seen by the position of their leaves and blossoms. Irritate the mimosa plant, as by roughly touching it, and the leaflets will suddenly change position. In the Dionæa muscipula, or Venus's flytrap, the touch of an insect, alighting upon the upper surface of the outspread laminæ, causes its sides to close suddenly, the strong bristles of the marginal fringe crossing each other like the teeth of a steel trap, and the two surfaces pressing together with considerable force, so as to retain, if not destroy, the intruder, whose struggles only increase the pressure which this animated trap exerts. It is evident that the elementary combinations under certain conditions and the influence of heat, will exhibit vital action, in an organic form--manifest phenomena of life, that are only in degree, and not in kind, inferior to the lowest plant life. The process is the same. The mode of living differs in degree, though the results are different. The combination and exchange of elements takes place in the simple plant life as in the higher animal life. The watery portion of plant life is composed of O and H2, the same as water in a free state or water in animal life, and the combination of Oxygen and Hydrogen with Carbon. The food substances are found in the vital machinery of vegetation.