1902.] KRAEMER — CONTINUITY OF PROTOPLASM. 175 



they can hardly be considered to be in the nature of protoplasm, 

 and substantiates this statement by quoting from De Bary and 

 Sachs. 



A few years later Gardiner/*" while working in the laboratory of 

 Sachs on certain sensitive plants, observed by the use of sulphuric 

 acid or chlor-zinc-iodide and Hofmann's blue or methylene blue, 

 colored stride in the walls of certain of the cells, which he consid- 

 ered to be in the nature of threads of protoplasm. A number of 

 other workers have also considered this subject, using a similar 

 technique to that of Gardiner, confirming his observations and 

 extending the number of species showing a continuity of proto- 

 plasm. 



The results obtained by these investigators tend to show that 

 there are two kinds of continuity of protoplasm, one through open- 

 ings in the pores which apparently occur in the larger number of 

 cases, and another in which the threads of protoplasm extend 

 through walls in which there are no pores. Several investigators " 

 even go so far as to express the view that probably every cell is 

 connected with its neighboring cells by protoplasmic threads. 



That there is a continuity of protoplasm has become almost a 

 fundamental principle in botany, it being considered necessary in 

 the transmission of irritation currents and in the distribution of 

 protoplasm and such bodies as starch grains and oil globules, intact 

 and quickly from cell to cell. 



While fully cognizant of the plausible arguments which have 

 been advanced in favor of the continuity of protoplasm, and, fur- 

 thermore, not desiring to consider the subject theoretically, by the 

 discussion of certain facts in regard to solution, osmosis, the ascent 

 of sap, and other physical phenomena that might more favorably 

 assist the plant in its various functions than a protoplasmic connec- 

 tion between the cells, the author presents herewith some of the 

 results of his studies on the structure of the starch grain and cell 

 wall, in the belief that they will throw some additional light on the 

 subject under consideration. 



Suffice it to say that these results seem to offer a different expla- 

 nation for the phenomena observed by the investigators already 

 mentioned, in their studies on the continuity of protoplasm. In 

 other words, the appearances described by these authors as indicat- 

 ing a continuity of protoplasm are due to a peculiarity in the 

 structure of the cell wall, which is made manifest by the reagents 



