The branches, moreover, as we have just
seen, sometimes possess organs capable of movement and independent
of the polypi. Surprising as this union of separate individuals in
a common stock must always appear, every tree displays the same
fact, for buds must be considered as individual plants. It is,
however, natural to consider a polypus, furnished with a mouth,
intestines, and other organs, as a distinct individual, whereas the
individuality of a leaf-bud is not easily realised; so that the
union of separate individuals in a common body is more striking in
a coralline than in a tree. Our conception of a compound animal,
where in some respects the individuality of each is not completed,
may be aided, by reflecting on the production of two distinct
creatures by bisecting a single one with a knife, or where Nature
herself performs the task of bisection. We may consider the polypi
in a zoophyte, or the buds in a tree, as cases where the division
of the individual has not been completely effected. Certainly in
the case of trees, and judging from analogy in that of corallines,
the individuals propagated by buds seem more intimately related to
each other, than eggs or seeds are to their parents.
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