STARCHES. 141 



If the ocular is placed in a horizontal position {B) it directs and 

 throws the rays into the small prism {G)^ at an angle of 45^, 

 providing it is focussed from the right position, where it is again 

 reflected at a right angle into the eye of the observer. Ober- 

 hauser's Camera is liked for the reason that it does not create a 

 disturbance nor a confusion by the reflection of the projected 

 picture at a right angle upon the projected paper placed in a 

 horizontal position. The Oberhauser Camera is attached to the 

 tube of the microscope at the ocular end without any trouble or 

 loss of time, and would be considered perfect but for one defi- 

 ciency. When the microscopic picture is twice reflected it loses a 

 considerable portion of its clearness and accuracy ; that is, in its 

 clearness and exactness. This is especially the case when high 

 powers, oil immersions, etc., are used ; it is then only by the 

 most concentrated light that the special and superficial contour of 

 the microscopic picture can be procured. 



By James W. Gatehouse, F.I.C. 



THE importance of starch will be at once perceived when it 

 is considered that starch-containing foods form the staple 

 nourishment of the human race and of domestic animals, 

 there being scarcely an order, and if we except certain fungi and 

 algae, barely a species in the vegetable kingdom but contains starch 

 in some form or other during certain periods of its growth. Starch 

 is not only found in plants, but in animals. Stafford found starch 

 in the blood of epileptic patients. Virchow found amyloid matter 

 in the spinal cord and nerve centres, and traced its distinct con- 

 nection with diseases of the bones. 



Whether we obtain starch from ears of wheat, tubers of the 

 potato, the thallus of lichens, from the pith of the palm, or from 

 the tissues of animals, it invariably consists of the same chemical 

 elements — carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, united always in the 

 same proportions ; the hydrogen and oxygen being in the propor- 

 tion to form water, whilst the number of carbon atoms is one less 



