450 Miscellaneous Intelligence. 



10. Employment of Slates for hastening the maturation of 

 Fruits. — A vine branch had been trained above the window of a 

 house, facinjir the south, according to custom, in certain parts of 

 France. Beneath this branch was a small slate roof, about three 

 feet wide, servini^ to shelter a door. It was remarked, that the 

 grapes on this roof were ripe and black, whilst those on the rest of 

 the branch were yet green. This effect, evidently due to the heat 

 accumulated in the slates from the rays of the sun, has been ad- 

 vantageously applied in assisting the ripening of wall-fruit.— M, 

 Bauchard — Bull. Univ. D. x. 230, 



11. Exhalation of Chlorine hy Maritime Plants. — M. Sprengel 

 says, that the plants which grow ou the sea shore, or in soils con- 

 taining common salt, exhale chlorine, principally in the night time; 

 that which is evolved when the sun is above the horizon, is imme- 

 diately converted into muriatic acid. The same plants, he says, 

 secrete chloride of sodium, which is deposited on their surfaces in 

 crystals. He believes, that all plants yielding soda in their ashes 

 when burnt, naturally exhale chlorine ; and that the muriatic acid 

 with which the atmosphere near the sea is charged, is not the result 

 of decomposed muriate of magnesia, but produced by maritime 

 plants, and particularly by different species of fucus. — Kastner^s 

 Archives^ vii. 161. 



12. Change of Colour in Leaves. — M. Macaire Princep has pub- 

 lished the account of a series of experiments on the autumnal co- 

 louration of leaves, and draws the following conclusions from them : 

 1st. All the coloured parts of vegetables appear to contain a par- 

 ticular substance (chromule,) susceptible of being changed in 

 colour by very slight modifications. 2d. The autumnal change in 

 the colour of leaves is due to the fixation of oxygen, or a kind of 

 acidification of the chromule in them. — Ann. de Chimie. xxxviii. 415. 



13. On a new kind of Salad. — M. Bosc states, that three or four 

 years since some grains of Indian cress {Sisymbrium Indicum, Linn.) 

 were sent from the Isle of France to the Jardin du Roi, and having 

 multiplied exceedingly were tried by him as salad for the table, 

 and have been judged of very favourably in consequence of their 

 power of yielding salad during the winter. 



Indian cress forms small patches on the ground about three 

 inches in diameter ; its leaves are very numerous, are irregularly 

 pinnated, have nearly round folioles, and about three lines in width; 

 the flowers are small, white, and disposed in axillary and terminal 

 pannicles ; they begin to fade about March. 



The qualities which render this cress desirable for cultivation in 

 our gardens, as a salad, are — 1st. That it is eminently antiscorbutic 

 and depurative ; 2d. That its leaves are more tender and less acrid 

 than those of other cresses, used as salads ; 3d. That it does not 

 suffer from the hardest winters ; does not require watering to ensure 



