igii] Francis Ernest Lloyd i? 



at one restricted point and flow out in a stream which mingles with 

 the water (Howard, 1906). During absorption, one may observe 

 that the cavities beconie spherkal, some may coalesce, and the 

 canals between them are obliterated (fig. 4a-c). If the fluid tannin- 

 mass were of uniform structure and consistence, these cavities 

 would flow in regulär paths at a uniformly increasing speed toward 

 the opening through which the fluid escapes. In point of fact they 

 behave quite differently. They may be whirled about in eddies of 

 constantly changing paths, here obstructed by an invisible some- 

 thing, and there moving with a rapid jerk. One of them, on reach- 

 ing the opening in the cell wall, may be caught in a returning stream 

 and find its way back into the interior. Ultimately they escape, 

 appearing as vacuoles, carried forward into the surrounding me- 

 dium by the flowing tannin-mass, and may be followed as I have 

 followed them, for a half-hour, during which time they remain per- 

 fectly spherical. They finally fade away and become invisible. 

 I have never seen one burst, nor have I been able by any means to 

 produce any reaction within them, They appear to contain a few 

 minute granules. I have not seen any definite limiting membrane. 

 In a Word, the fluid tannin-mass acts much as would a group of 

 very much softened and swoUen starch grains, or, better, of fluid 

 droplets of jelly coalescing and enclosing bubbles of the water in 

 which they were suspended. 



Perhaps the most difficult part of my task has been to obtain 

 a clear idea of the relation of this mass to the tannin it carries. 

 As I have earlier shown (1910) and as is readily observable to be 

 the case, the tannin-mass in the intact cell lies against the proto- 

 plasm. The film of water between them cannot by any Stretch of 

 the imagination be regarded as the Container of the entire, large 

 amount of free or soluble tannin which reagents show is present 

 in the immature cell, nor would the case be helped materially by 

 including the volumes of the canals and other cavities. The amount 

 of soluble tannin is so great as to produce the well known astrin- 

 gency of the unripe fruit, and, when a weak reagent is applied in- 

 stead of water, the bursting of the cell is followed by the rapid 

 coloration of the escaping tannin and tannin-mass. I distinguish 

 between them because the former, the free or soluble tannin. 



