A WREATH OF JASMINE
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—If we are to attach a literal meaning to the description of Sir Jagadis Chander Bose's experiments and the theory which he seems to build upon them, we must, I think, conclude that he has added a new terror to life. Think of the myriad sufferings of the grass as it is cropped by the animal herds ! Think of the tortures inflicted by the fair owner of a garden as she cuts her nosegay of roses-!
As I contemplate these things, I take refuge in a complete scepticism. It may be quite true—it must be true—that living vegetable tissue reacts in some fashion to all assaults upon its integrity whether made by mechanical means or by chemical. But is there any reason to suppose that there is pain ? A vegetable has not a centralized nervous system like the animals which, so far as we know, feel pain. Yet even animals of lower organization, it would appear, do not feel any great intensity of pain. This has been proved, I think, in the case of crabs. But compare a crab with a plant. When a crab loses a claw, it can grow another claw. But whoever saw a claw grow into a crab ? On the other hand, there are multitudes of plants which can be grown from cuttings. The geranium (as gardeners call it) can be cut into fragments, and every fragment will produce a. new geranium. And there is no sign of the disorganization which would be produced by torture. The " pang " of which we read seems to me to be pure imagination.
I write, not as a scientific student of physiology, but merely as
A PLANT-LOVER..
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