160 MR. R. H. BIFFEN ON THE 
The wood extracted with dilute hydrochloric acid is attacked, 
so far as one can determine, in the same manner as unextracted 
wood; but both here and in the former case sporophores have 
not been formed though the wood was infected for twelve weeks 
(May 23rd-Aug. 15th). 
The growth of the sporophores on the sodden cotton-wool 
plugs is also to be explained by the presence of small quantities 
of soluble carbohydrates extracted from the wood during the 
wet-sterilizing process, for it was found impossible to grow them 
on moist cotton-wool only. 
Attempts were made to extract the enzyme which, it is 
assumed, dissolves the cellulose by splitting it into soluble 
carbohydrates. Large flask-cultures were grown for this purpose 
on shavings, and extracted by grinding with sand and water, 
glycerine, sodium carbonate, or dilute hydrochlorie acid. To 
these solutions a small quantity of potassium cyanide solution or 
chloroform-water was added, to check the growth of the bacteria 
which entered during the grinding. The filtered extracts were 
then tested with thin sections of wood and young stems, and 
with eotton-wool, but no difference could be detected between 
them and the boiled controls. However, the failure to isolate 
the enzyme cannot be taken as a proof of its absence, knowing, 
as one does, the difficulty of obtaining these bodies. 
Testing water extracts of infected wood for sugars with 
Fehling's solution, or with phenyl hydrazine and acetic acid, and 
sections with a-naphthol and sulphurie acid, also failed to give 
results, so that if sugars are formed on the breaking down of the 
cellulose-walls, they are quickly changed by the action of the 
hyphs *. 
Another source of carbohydrate food-material is afforded by 
the glucosides so widely present in wood. Bourquelot t has 
shown that Collybia velutipes contains an emulsin-like enzyme, 
which on extraction was found to decompose æsculin and amyg- 
dalin with the formation of glucose. 
A further enzyme, an oxidase, is also stated to be present 
in the sporophores of this fungus, but until it has been 
isolated and its action macrochemically tested, it is useless to 
speculate as to its functions. 
* Bourquelot, Bull. de la Soc, mye. de France, t. viii, p. 13, 
t Ibid. t. x. p. 49. 
