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ping List thinks will be eventually overcome, as it is not often that any 

 Ijractieal problem of this kind long resists the pertinacious attentions of 

 modern inventors. As we have already informed our readers, the East 

 Indian government has proposed a prize of $25,000 for a machine or 

 process that will accomplish this object. The award has not yet been 

 made, the period having lately been extended, owing to the unsatisfactory 

 nature of the competing machines. The oifer, however, still holds good, 

 and the prize will, we presume, be assigned in due course of time. 



Experiments on the germination of seeds. — Mr. Yogel, of the 

 Bavarian Academy of Sciences, has made a series of interesting exper- 

 iments on the germination of seeds exposed to the action of different 

 chemicals, either in a solid or a liquid condition. He found that many 

 chemical combinations, though absolutely insoluble in distilled water, 

 injured or destroyed the germs of seeds, and inferred that the process 

 of germination itself produces vegetable acids which then act as sol- 

 vents. He was actually able to determine, by sprouting barley, clover, 

 and water-cress, the amount of said acids, which, though differing with 

 diiferent seeds, was always quite considerable. He experimented with 

 Prussian blue, carbonate of magnesia, oxide and carbonate of copper, 

 chromate of mercury, sulphur, and antimonial preparations, and, more 

 recently, with aniline and amorphous phosphorus, and found that all 

 these insoluble substances prevented germination, either entirely or to a 

 great extent, while the presence of sublimed indigo had not the least 

 effect. Of solutions, he mentions chromate of i^otash (nitrate of silver) 

 and arsenious acid, as especially injurious, and states that other mineral 

 acids, when very much diluted, are less obnoxious. Remarkable for the 

 anomaly is the destructive influence of acetic acid, so harmless to the 

 animal organism, which, even in very small quantity, prevented germi- 

 nation as completely as the poisonous oxalic acid ; prussic acid, on the 

 contrary, only retarded the development of the germ. Being volatile, 

 it disappears from the solution, and a great proportion of the seeds 

 germinated, while arsenic acid, destroyed the germs entirely. Mr. 

 Yogel also exposed liis seeds to an atmosphere of coal gas, and 

 found that when thoroughly imrified its influence was not deleterious. 

 Believing that the destructive action of the impure gas is due to 

 the admixture of tar, he examined some of its constituents, and. found 

 naphthaliu to be quite harmless to vegetation, while a minimum of 

 carbolic acid was sufficient to kill every trace of germination. 



Eaising fruit trees from the seed. — Mr. A. Czerny, of Austria, 

 states, as the result of long-continued observations and experiments, 

 that the strongest and best fruit trees can be raised from seed, thus ob- 

 viating a great deal of expense and disappointment to the pomologist. 

 Accorcling to his observations, the extent and ramification of the roots 

 of a healthy tree is to that of its crown in the ratio of three to two, so 

 that the action of the roots is always preponderating. In this relation 

 he finds the reason why fruit ^eds from trees, budded or grafted upon 

 iudiflerent stocks, have always been found unreliable, and he endeavors, 

 as the first step, to obtain good trees grown upon their own stock, the seeds 

 of which, he says, will reproduce their i)arents with certainty. To this 

 end he layers a branch of a good tree, which, when well rooted, serves 

 him as stock, into which he introduces buds or scions of such varieties 

 as promise to imi^rove the original fruit. By judicious cross fertilization 

 he obtains fruit, the seed of which will propagate, to a greater or less 

 extent, the good qualities of the varieties used in hybridizing, and thus 

 a new fruit is originated which, when suitable, can alwaj-s be reproduced 



