1868. ] Botany and Vegetable Physiology. 228 
it is therefore of importance to select the capsules which have the 
greatest number of cells, in order to obtain a greater number of 
tufts of cotton. The oblique position and nearly radiating arrange- 
ment of the stamens renders artificial fecundation difficult, in con- 
sequence of the difficulty of cutting them all down to the bottom 
of the calyx, and removing them without the falling of a little 
seminal dust upon the stigmata. Nevertheless M. Balsamo succeeded 
in avoiding the contact of the anthers, and in transporting the 
pollen to the pistil of the flowers from which he had removed all 
the stamina. The cotton-flowers open about noon and close up 
again after fecundation, the stamina acquire a more vertical position, 
and the pistil lowers its stigmata towards the stamina which are 
beneath it; the corolla changes from yellow to rosy red, and on the 
following day it falls withered. If it happens to rain on the day of 
the flowering of the cotton-tree, the water which remains in the 
flower alters and blackens the pollen; in that case natural fecundation 
itself may fail, and the withered flower does not fall or falls very late. 
Besides his experiments on artificial hybridization of cotton- 
trees, M. Balsamo has investigated the action of light on the 
germination of the seeds. He found by using a glass jar full of 
vegetable mould, that seeds exposed to the action of sunlight were 
greatly retarded in, if not entirely prevented from, germination. 
Seeds to which only yellow light had access were not affected. 
Grrmany.—The Origin of Bacteria.—A German lady, Frau 
Liiders, of Kiel, has been investigating this matter with the micro- 
scope, and has published her conclusions in Schultze’s ‘Archiv.’ 
Her paper is one of very great interest, and her researches have 
been ably and carefully conducted. She believes that she has 
proved—what many fungologists were prepared for—that Vibriones 
(leaving aside the question of there being more than one species) 
are produced from the spores and germinal filaments of various 
moulds or fungi—amongst which are enumerated Mucor, Peni- 
cillium, Botrytis, Torula, Manilia, Aspergillum, Leptosporium, Ar- 
throbotrys, Acremonium, and Verticillium. It is impossible here 
to give an account of the precautions adopted in growing these 
fungi, but they appear to have been satisfactory. Professor Hensen, 
of Kiel, strongly supports all Frau Liiders says. She is also 
induced to believe that the blood of living animals contains V7- 
briones, either in the catenated form, or in that of the constituent 
eranules ; but during life, and until putrescence commences, these 
are always quiescent, and show no signs of active existence. In 
support of this, the following experiment by Professor Hensen is 
quoted. The extremity of a glass tube bent im the form of a 
W, with the ends drawn out and quite closed, and which had 
been exposed for half-an-hour to 200° C., was thrust into the 
heart of a recently killed guinea-pig, and then broken off. After 
the blood had sucked into the tube from the other end, which 
