1868. | Chemistry. oy 
deau have published accounts of some investigations into this highly 
interesting matter in the ‘ Comptes Rendus.’ It is to be regretted 
that more critical examinations of the phenomena of movement in 
the higher plants have not been made. M. Bert shows that the 
natural and regular movement of the leaves, which takes place in 
the Sensitive plant, is produced by a different cause from that to 
- which the sudden contraction is due when the plant is touched by 
the fingers. M. Blondeau’s observations are exceedingly curious, 
and are well worth further examination. He submitted three plants 
to the influence of an electric current from a Ruhmkorff’s coil. The 
first he acted on for five minutes; when left to itself, the plant 
seemed prostrated, but after a quarter-of-an-hour, the leaves opened, 
and it seemed to recover itself. The second specimen was acted on 
for ten minutes. The specimen was prostrate for an hour, after 
which it slowly recovered. The third specimen was galvanized for 
twenty-five minutes, but it never recovered, and in twenty-four hours 
it had the appearance of a plant struck by lightning. A fourth 
plant was etherized and then exposed to the current. Strange to 
say, the latter had not any effect, the leaves remained straight and 
open ; thus proving, says M. Blondeau, that the mode of the con- 
traction of the leaves of the Sensitive plant is in some way allied to 
the muscular contraction of animals. 
5. CHEMISTRY. 
(Including the Proceedings of the Chemical Society.) 
Among the papers calling for special mention this quarter are those 
by Dr. A. W. Hofmann, “On the Production of Formic Aldehyde.” 
The method by which the author has succeeded in forming this 
hitherto unknown body was shown at a meeting of the Chemical 
Society, and will be described in our Report of the Proceedings. 
Other papers of great scientific value have been communicated by 
the same author to the Royal Society, “On the Homologues of 
Prussic Acid.”* These also were briefly referred to at the meeting 
of the Chemical Society. 
Dr. E. Schunck has also contributed to the Royal Society a 
valuable series of papers “ On the Chemistry of Urine.” These, as 
well as the paper by Dr. Hofmann, do not admit of abridgment, 
and we must refer our readers interested in the subjects to the 
Proceedings of the Royal Society.t 
The past quarter has not been marked by any specially inter- 
esting discovery, and but few facts call for notice. M. EK. Duclauxt 
* ‘Proceedings of the Royal Society,’ vol. xvi., p. 144. 7 Vol. xvi., p. 73. 
I ‘Comptes Rendus,’ t. lxv., p. 1099. 
