Vol. XIV. No. 336. 



Tin: V(_;i;icl'i/itkal NEWS. 



95 



proceeding of the third interna 

 tiona i. congress of troph '.i l aorit 'ul cure. 



John /lull Sons and Danielsson, Ltd. London 1914. Pi 

 10s. net. 



This publication contains abstracts supplied bj authors 

 of the papers which were read at the I ongress held in London 

 last June. Reports of the discussions are also included, it is 

 unnecessary to describe the contents more fully in this d itice, 

 since a large number of the abstracts have already appeared 

 in the Agricultural News. Those int. rested gi nerally in tropi- 

 cal agriculture, and particularly those desiring information on 

 international progress concerning any particular crop, are 

 strongly advised to procuri i pi oi these Proceedings. It 



is underst I that a complete collection of the papers, 



in extenso, is soon to appear. 



TIMBERS OF BRITISH GUIANA. By Herbert 

 Stone and W. G. Freeman, B.Sc. Published by the 

 Government oj British Guiana. 1914. Price 5s. net. 



This book consists of a technical report upon the 

 collection of British Guiana woods, made by the Hon. A. G. 

 Bell, for sometime Colonial Civil Engineer. The speciesfrom 

 which many ofthe samples were obtained have not insome cases 

 been identified owing to the difficulty of obtaining flowers. It 

 might besuggested; too, that even when flowers of trees can be 

 obtained, thej are generally small and fragile, so as to make 

 preservation, particularly under forest conditions, a matter of 

 difficulty. Bach description is divided into first, physical and 

 economic characters including uses, qualities, etc., and second- 

 ly, anatomical characters. It would seem that the authors 

 consider that a large number of the .voods possess little econo- 

 mic value outside British Guiana. In putting forward this 

 view, they will no doubt have borne in mind that many of 

 their specimens were obtained from trees which had not 



attained a state of maturity. The book is essentially one for 

 reference, and perusal of the volume inclines one to the view 

 that the report will be found verj useful for the purpose of 

 enabling the student to recognize any one of the woods des- 

 cribed, even though it may not afford him enough information 

 to obtain the botanical name of the tree which produced it. 

 It occurs to US that similar reports would he useful in regard 

 to Dominica and British Honduras 



TRANSPIRATION AND THE ASCENT OF SAP 

 IN PLANTS. By Henry 11.1 tixon, Sc.D., F.R.S., Macr.iiltan 

 & Co., Ltd., London, 191 1. Price 5s. 



A .short account of a notice of this hook in Nature 

 appeared in a recent number of the Agricultural News, it 

 is now} intended to supplement this reference with a short 

 review of the hook itself. The volume under consideration is 

 one of Macmillan's Science Monographs, of which The Cott 

 Plant in Egypt (reviewed in these pages) is one of the 

 companion volumes. The subject dealt with in the present 

 treatise involves a problem of old standing. Several theories 

 have been advanced with aview to explaining the ascent ol 



sap in high trees, 



sufficient^ adequate This, the author shows, applies 



especially to the so-called vital theories. Thi 



ew i I lhapter I V, in whii h is 



expounded the author's tl j (first published about 1894) ol 



cohesion as a can.- ip mot accurately, a c lit ion 



of the ascent of sap. Tins chapb ci does, 



pre\ ious by pothi Che 



of water on which tl besfo'n theory is based is explained 



by means of a simple ex pi tment, which shows that wa 

 a . I tube from which air has been expelled, will n 

 suspended in the longer limb again I gravity. It is 

 shown in this way that the lower pari of the wa 

 the longer limb of th transmits a stress through the 

 upper part ol the glass, equivalent to its gravitational pull. 

 In this way the authi es thai the water in the con- 

 ducting tracks of high trees hangs there by virtue ol coh 

 jusl in the same way as the watei bangs in the experiment, 

 w nli the . I tube just di b d This rem Blackmail's 



expression that transpiration is 'thi ; up ol ro] 



water.' 



Information in the Look, hitherto unpublished in the 

 author's previous papers, seems principally to be that which 



explains why empty vessels in the stems do not ini 



cohesion. 



A large amount of data is given in the book i 



ing the tensile strength of sap, the osmotic pressure of the 

 leaf, and theruio elect ric eryosi pj 



W.L'.I). 



WEST INDIAN PRODUCTS. 



DRUGS AND SPICES IN THE LONDON 

 MARKET. 



Mr. J. R. Jackson LL.S., lias forwarded the follow- 

 ing report on the London drug and spice markets for 

 the month of January : - 



GINGER, S I TW BGS, \M> M Mi;. 



In the matter of ginger there is nothing to report, 

 except to say that business has been of a normal charac 

 ter. Xutmegsand mace were in good supply at the auction on 

 January 20, when l~><> packages of the former from the 

 West Indies were offered and sold at the following rates: 58 S, at 

 Is. Id.; 63's to 72's, 5|d. to 9tf.; 74's to 86's, 4JaT. to 7-/.: 86's 

 to 97's, i, ; .(. to 6d; UO'sto I20's, \\d. to Ifd.; and I34's to 

 1 I I's. .'i.'.ii. to i\d.: 99 pai kages ol Eastern were also brough 

 forward and partly sold, 65's fetching 9d.; 88's, \\d. ; and I His 

 to L'25's, Id!, to i\d. At the same auction 80 packages of 

 West, Indian mace and II package, of Eastern were also 



offered, and sold, the f iei fetching Is. to Is. \0d. per lb., and 



the latter Is. to Is. Id. 



CITRIC ACID, LIME OIL, LIME \M> KOLA. 



At the beginning of the month citric acid was quoted 

 at from 2s. 6d. to 2s. <>}.d. per lb., but a fortnight later it was 



slightly firmer, which position it retained to the end of the 



month. In the eail. pa ith, West Indian distilled 



lime oil realized from 2s. lOJd. to 3s. per lb., and for c 

 bright hand pressed Dominica, 8s. 6d. was asked. At the close 

 of the month fair West Indian distilled was offered at 2s. o</., 

 and hand pressed, for which there has been but little demand, 

 at 7s. Gd. Lime juice throughout the month has remained at 

 2s. 9d. for fair pale. Kola nuts have been in good supply, 

 as many as 172 pai i I ing offered at auction on the 13th, 



but 11 only were sold, 2fd. per lb. being the price asked for 



medium Jamaica. 



