158 
concludes that, contrary to the usually accepted theory, these 
crystals are soluble in many of the plant acids. 
Farther than this, he says these acids are active only when 
very dilute, also that the liquid in the physiologically dead crys- 
tal-tubes has the periodically changing weak acid reaction com- 
mon to ordinary plant sap, theréfore contains some acids 
and salts. This liquid, he says, cannot be considered as ina 
state of rest, but is subject to constant motion and change, and 
thus the surfaces of the crystals are exposed to a changing stream 
of liquid, certain at some time to hold a weak acid. 
This fact inconnection with the absence of protoplasmic contents 
in the crystal tubes, he considers very suggestive of the functions of 
the crystals. This difference in the quantity of crystals in winter 
and spring was not confined to the bark, but was found also in 
rhizomes and other parts from which outgrowths spring. 
fee se 
Le Genre Meliola—Anatomie Morphologie Systematique. A. 
Gaillard. 163 pp. 8vo. Paris, 1892). 
In this memoir one hundred and eleven species are described 
and one hundred and eight figured on twenty-four plates. The 
species are divided into two sections: first, those having ovoid of 
globose asci; second, those having clavate or cylindrical asci. 
According to the author, the short, alternate or opposite branches 
of the mycelium known as hyphopodia, are only undeveloped 
perithecia, the number of those organs actually developing into 
perithecia being very small in comparison with those that remain 
undeveloped. 
The memoir is a very interesting and valuable one, and will 
be read with pleasure and profit by all who are interested in the 
beautiful genus of which it treats, 
J. B. ELLIS. 
Note sur un Kelloggia de la Chine. A. Franchet. (Journ. de 
Bot. vi. 10). 
It is interesting to note the discovery in the Chinese province 
Yun-nan, at an altitude of 3200 m., of a Kelloggia that closely 
resembles K. galioides, Torrey. The habitat of the latter is i” 
the coniferous forests of the Sierra Nevada and the mountains 0 
Arizona, Utah, Washington and Wyoming, and the finding of 
