B OT AN Y 



MOHL OX CHLOROPHYLL. 



MOHL believes that the grains of chlorophyll do not belong to the ternary 

 series of products at all, but consist of a soft proteinous substance, related to 

 albumen, in which in most cases one or more starch-grains are imbedded, and 

 which owes its green hue to the presence of an extremely small quantity of 

 green coloring matter, seemingly deposited only or principally in its outer 

 layer. By demonstrating the occurrence of chlorophyll in cells which con- 

 tained no starch, or the growth of the green globules after the starch-grams 

 have vanished, and in other cases the simultaneous increase of starch and 

 chlorophyll grains in the same cells, Mohl has shown the groundlessness of 

 Mulder's hypothesis, that chlorophyll is formed of starch altered by deoxyda- 

 tion, and that the evolution of oxygen by green foliage is merely the result 

 of this supposed transformation of starch into green coloring matter and wax; 

 and he maintains that, by appropriate evidence, he has abundantly demon- 

 strated the principal mass of chlorophyll grains to consist of a substance allied 

 to protoplasm, which certainly can not originate from a metamorphosis of the 

 constituents of starch. 



CHLOROPHYLL IX GREEN INFUSORIA. 



Prince Salm Horstmar has found that the green infusoria which form so 

 abundantly on stagnant water, when treated with alcohol, give an extract 

 having all the properties of a solution of chlorophyll. It gives the black band 

 in the red part of the spectrum described by Stokes, as weh 1 as dispersion of a 

 blood-red light. The same result was obtained with an alcoholic extract of 

 Spongia fluviatilis. Poggendorff^s Annalem, vol. xciii., p. 150. 



THE MORA EXCELSA-TREE OF THE WEST INDIES. 



Prominent among the trees which adorn the forests of Guiana, and which 

 astonish by their profuse verdure and gigantic size, stands the majestic Mora, 

 the king of the forest. Rising to the height of from 60 to 90 feet before it 

 gives out branches, it towers over the wall-like vegetation which skirts the 

 banks of the rivers of Guiana, forming a crown of the most splendid foliage, 



