300 ROMANCE OF LOW LIFE AMONGST PLANTS. 



to the surface In small globules. Even portions of 

 the ginger at times are affected with the motions 

 going on, and ascend and descend, as do the lighter 

 and more buoyant fungus. This so-called plant 

 certainly cannot be credited with the production of 

 ginger-beer. It simply produces an aerated liquid in 

 this way — that the fungus seems to convert the sugar, 

 or saccharine, into alcohol and water, accompanied 

 by the emission of carbonic-acid gas ; and evidently 

 as the pieces become charged with the gas, they 

 become buoyant and ascend, falling again when the 

 buoyancy is lost. In twenty-four hours the sugar 

 and water arc converted into a pleasant sub-acid 

 beverage, and either ginger or essence of lemon 

 creates a non-effervescent drink far more pleasant 

 than is ordinarily manufactured. Fresh water and 

 sugar should be added about every twenty-four 

 hours." 1 



Mr. Marshall Ward has recently turned his atten- 

 tion to this subject,^ and made numerous investiga- 

 tions and cultures, the results differing from those of 

 previous observers. He finds that the substance 

 consists essentially of a symbiotic association of a 

 saccharomycete and schizomycete, mixed with various 

 other forms. These he groups as follows: — 



I, The essential organisms are a yeast, which 

 turns out to be a new species, allied to SaccJia- 

 romyces ellipsoideiis (Reess), which he proposes to 

 call SaccJiaromyces pyriforniis ; and a bacterium, also 



' Gardener's Chronicle, June 7, 1S84, p. 748. 



« "The Ginger-Beer Plant, etc.," by H. Marshall Ward, M,A., in 

 Proceedings of Royal Society, Jan. 20, 1892, p, 261. 



