64 TKANSAGTIONS AND I'itOCKKDlNGS OK TllK [Sess. LXV. 



Thus, in the biomore, there exists a set of conditions — 

 " the internal hiomorie medium " — produced Ijy the bio- 

 molecules themselves, which renders them more or less 

 independent of the external conditions of environment. 

 This conception of the biomore as a group of biomolecules 

 juxtaposed in a condition of unstable equilibrium, furnishes 

 an easy explanation of the fatal effects of high temjjeratures 

 on living matter. The biouiolecular groups are decom- 

 posed, and produce molecular groups different from the 

 biomolecules, and incapable, therefore, of giving origin to 

 vital phenomena. 



As showing that the trend of modern botanical opinion 

 is towards some such conception as this biomore, we may 

 quote the following extracts from Pfeffer's " Physiology of 

 Plants" (English translation). On page 32 he says: "It 

 is, as a matter of fact, not inconceivable that the existence 

 of certain species, as such, depends upon protoplastic or 

 symbiotic unions. . . . Nor is the probability excluded 

 that the tiny symbiont might be too small to be visible, or 

 might be unable to continue an independent existence 

 outside of the protoplast." Again, p. 43, speaking of the 

 microsomes he says: "They may be composed in some cases 

 of non-living substance, but in other cases may be minute 

 living plastids. But few of the organs and structural 

 elements of which protoplasm is composed are visible even 

 with the highest powers of the microscope, nevertheless we 

 must conclude, on theoretical grounds, that all living 

 material is built up of most minute living units." 



Bioplasma is a mass of living matter of any dimensions, 

 composed of any number of biomores, of varied chemical 

 constitution immersed in a liquid matrix — the interhiomoric 

 liquid. The conception bioplasma is at once wider and 

 also more restricted than protoplasm, in that it includes all 

 the living granules, not only those of the general cell-body, 

 but the nucleus, central corpuscle, archoplasma, paranuclear 

 corpuscle, in fact all the parts able to assimilate, and 

 consequently to live ; it excludes starch, cell-sap, sugars, 

 oil, etc., which do not assimilate, but are merely the result 

 of elaboration of the living parts. 



The difficulty of distinguishing the bioplasm from the 

 non-living matters mentioned above is admitted, but the 



