PLANT MOTIONS AND GROWTH 



8i 



Plant Motions and Growth. 



Professor Jagadis Chunder Bose of 

 the University of Calcutta, who has 

 been spending the winter travelling 

 and lecturing- in "The States," is prob- 

 ably the world's first authority on the 

 movements of the common higher 

 plants. He is originally a teacher of 

 physics, and being accustomed in thai 

 precise science to delicate apparatus 

 and accurate measurement, he has lat- 

 terly turned that experience to the 

 minute motions of the plant world. 

 Among other delicate tools, he has in- 

 vented one that will record the growth 

 of a tendril-tip during each half minute, 

 and by distances less than the thick- 

 ness of tissue paper, show the change 

 of rate with alterations of temperature 

 or w^ater supply. Still another will ex- 

 hibit the turning of a green leaf toward 

 the flame of a match held near it for 

 only ten seconds. 



By such means as these, Professor 

 Bose has been able to prove that the 

 green plants are essentially like cold- 

 blooded animals. Their tissues are at 

 the same time both nerve and muscle ; 

 and they respond like an animal to 

 heat and cold, electric shocks, scratch- 

 es and pin pricks. They are even af- 



fected by drugs like a very sluggish 

 animal, and have a true rigor mortis 

 when they die. 



The Largest Spider Web in the World. 



P.V ROUKRT [I. AIOL'LTON. 



The largest spider web in the world 

 was spun, not Ly a spider, but by hu- 

 man hands. It stands on the lawn of a 

 Chicago man's country home, and is of 

 such tremendous size as to startle the 

 passerby when he first sees it. 



The creator of this interesting odd- 

 ity conceived the idea of attempting to 

 see how closely an actual spider's web 

 could be reproduced with rope. Select- 

 ing two immense trees on the lawn of 

 his home, he spun between them this 

 spider's web, forty by sixty feet, which 

 is so strong that a boy or man may 

 easily climb to the center or top of it. 



The web faces the main thorough- 

 fare, which passes the house, and is 

 one of the most fascinating country 

 ground decorations ever seen. The 

 spinner could not attain the minute- 

 ness of the actual spider's work, but 

 came so near to it that the illusion is 

 almost perfect- The uniqueness of the 

 undertaking catches and fascinates 

 everv eve. — Scientific American. 



THE SPIDER WEB OF ROPES. 

 Cut by courtesy of "Scientific American. 



