BOOKS AND CURRENT LITERATURE 



Plant Physiology: with Reference to Plant Production. — Pro- 

 fessor B. M. Duggar's book has a descriptive and suggestive title 1 

 which, in this day of courses in agriculture even in the schools (especially 

 city schools?), should give it a prompt sale. What is of equal, if theoret- 

 ical, importance is that the book deserves a good sale, for it is an inter- 

 esting presentation of the main facts of plant physiology by a man of 

 such training, experience and present interests that he can see the sub- 

 ject in its relations to other subjects as a pure physiologist probably can- 

 not. The book is interesting also as an evidence of the appreciation, 

 by those not physiologists of the value of plant physiology in "practical" 

 life. It has often been said that any study of plants will and must aid 

 the agriculturist. A moment's reflection will show that this is not true; 

 and it must be admitted that the use of most of the physiologist's store 

 of facts is hidden in the future. The beneficial results of the study of 

 botany by students in the agricultural colleges — -and it is especially for 

 these that the book is written — are of two sorts : first, the acquisition of 

 a knowledge of plants which they can themselves apply to their own satis- 

 faction, both as pleasure and as profit; and second, a realisation that, 

 at times, general knowledge should be supplemented by special, as when 

 a man calls upon an oculist instead of his family physician or of pre- 

 scribing for himself. No one can lay down this book with the feeling 

 that he knows the whole subject, for Professor Duggar takes pains to 

 avoid sweeping general statements and to point out the limits of our 

 knowledge. These limits, however, are spoken of not as barriers but as 

 problems. 



The various topics of plant physiology are presented in somewhat 

 unusual perspective. For example, the devotion of only thirteen pages 

 to growth movements is in marked contrast to the books of thirty years 

 ago (or even less), in which growth movements were described at great 

 length, with scarcely an idea as to their mechanism and meanings. Per- 

 haps thirty pages devoted to variation (which is real and recognizable) 

 and heredity (an abstraction of which less and less is known as studies 



1 Duggar, B. M., Plant Physiology, with Special Reference to Plant Production. 

 Pp. 516, figs. 144; New York, The Macmillan Company, 1911 ($1.60). 



29 



