Miscellaneous. 385 



These movements and these noises have often distracted me from 

 my other observations, but without striking my mind, which was 

 absorbed by the study of the ejection of water. I ascribed them, 

 without accounting for them, either to the agitation of the atmo- 

 sphere, to some of my own movements, to the hasty flight of some 

 bird concealed in that impenetrable mass of foliage, or to an error of 

 the eye produced by the fatigue which always follows too prolonged 

 tension of the sight, &c. &c. 



The observations of M. Lecoq are therefore to me a plain and 

 genuine explanation of a very curious phenomenon which he has the 

 merit of being the first to discover and to study with the sagacity 

 which is habitual to him ; my only aim is to confirm a new fact, and 

 one which may appear extraordinary. 



M. Lecoq says in his note that he had never been able to observe 

 the fine drops that I have seen so often shoot from the vulvoid 

 region situated underneath the apex. He himself gives the cause of 

 it when he states that the membrane which covers that region is, in 

 the leaves of his plant of Colocasia, imperforate. This imperfora- 

 tion (or, rather, this absence of large stomata, orifices of ejection) 

 is extremely rare in the leaves of the species of Colocasia that I cul- 

 tivate in the open ground ; I have only detected it in the propor- 

 tion approximately of 1 to 80. I am surprised that all the leaves ob- 

 served by that learned naturalist should have presented this anomaly 

 of the imperforation of the hymenoid membrane. Does this depend 

 on the mode of culture, or on a difference of species ? Eleven 

 leaves of two plants of Colocasia, cultivated in a hot stove, have 

 likewise never presented the least trace of gaping stomata. Be 

 this as it may, M. Lecoq would perhaps see a certain relation of 

 cause to effect between the spontaneous movements of the leaves and 

 their imperforation. My own observations are not favourable to 

 this hypothesis. 



I take advantage of this opportunity to say that this year the 

 leaves in vernation have furnished me with still more remarkable 

 results than those referred to in my memoir. My observations 

 date from the 1st of May to the 15th of November. Now it is in 

 the month of June, at the period when vegetation is in all its vigour, 

 that the ejection of the water is also most vigorous. I have seen 

 some convoluted leaves which, during cool evenings, emitted a con- 

 tinuous jet. Careful watchings certainly betrayed a slight inter- 

 mittence ; but it was absolutely impossible to count the drops, the 

 number of which constantly exceeded 200 per minute. — Comptes 

 Rendus, May 13, 1867, pp. 979-980. 



On two new forms of Plants parasitic on Man (Aspergillus flavescens 

 and A. nigricans). By Robert Wreden. 



From the 25th November, 1864, to the 25th May, 1867, I had 

 the opportunity of observing the development of two new forms of 

 Ann. ^ Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 3. Vol. xx. 26 



