ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY, MICROSCOPY, ETC. 73 



pseudocarp, forming a false berry in which the bracfceoles as well as the 

 ovary-walls contribute to the formation of the pericarp. 



The author is unable to make a suggestion as to the special biological 

 significance of the false berries of L. alpigena and L. cmrulea, beyond 

 the possibility that the adaptations have some connection with the 

 alpine conditions under which these species thrive. 



New Graft-Hybrid.* — L. Daniel describes a graft-hybrid which 

 originated under the following circumstances from a grafted pear in the 

 garden of the St. Vincent Institution at Rennes. The pears had been 

 badly attacked with chermes, and to prolong their life had been severely 

 pruned and cut down to within about 2 metres from the ground. 

 M. Daniel followed carefully the results of this severe disturbance of 

 the relation between the absorbing and transpiring members of the 

 plant. In every case the grafts put out shoots which were for the most 

 part more or less drooping. The fruit-buds flowered and bore fruit in 

 the same year, yielding monstrous productions, the form and structure 

 of which the author has already described {La Theorie des capacites 

 fonctionnelles, Rennes, 1902). Hitherto only one of the stocks has 

 developed shoots (a Coignassier, on which is grafted a William pear), 

 but these are of special interest. Two, which are situated well below 

 the cushion, preserve all the characters of the normal plant, but, at the 

 level of the cushion, on a protuberance entirely covered by the cortex 

 of the stock, are three other shoots, which in their size, direction, 

 indumentum, number of lenticels, and leaf -characters are more or less 

 intermediate between the stock and the graft. They represent a graft- 

 hybrid in the same sense as those obtained by the writer in experimenting 

 with herbaceous plants, or those which have since been recorded in 

 woody plants. M. Daniel again points out that the absence of observa- 

 tions on graft-hybrids in the Rosacese, although members of this order 

 have been grafted from time immemorial and in large numbers, is due 

 to the constant suppression of shoots on the stock. 



Lindmark, Gunnar — Om Adventiv Lbkbildning pi Stjalken hos Liiium can- 



didum. (On formation of adventitious bulbils on the stem of Liiium candidum.) 



[The author describes and figures a remarkably copious bulbil formation on 



the stem of this lily.] Bihang h. Svensh. Vet.-Ahad. Handl., xxviii. (190o) 



Afd. iii., No. 3, pp. 1-9 (1 pi.). 



Physiology. 

 Nutrition and Growth. 



Photosynthesis.! — T. Bokorny, experimenting with Petroselinum 

 sativum, shows that assimilation of carbon dioxide is checked in solu- 

 tions containing 1 part of formaldehyde in 20,000, and even by 1 in 

 50,000. It is therefore impossible for appreciable amounts of formal- 

 dehyde to accumulate in plants ; but there is nothing improbable in the 

 assumption that this is immediately converted into carbohydrate. As 

 regards reduction of carbon monoxide, the author points out that pro- 



* Comptes Eendus, cxxxvii. (1903) pp. 7G5-7. 



t Chem. Zeit, xxvii. (1903) pp. 525-7. See also Journ. Chem. Soc, lxxxiv. (1903) 

 ii. p. 505. 



