204 LIFE AND WORK OF SIR JAGADIS C. BOSE 



His confidence has been fully justified. The varied 

 phenomena of life-movements in plants, apparently so 

 capricious, had hitherto been regarded as incapable of 

 any rational generalisation. Bose, however, has succeeded 

 in showing that all these diverse movements the complex 

 variations of growth, the twining of tendrils, the curvature 

 towards or away from light, and even the diametrically 

 opposite movements of root and shoot under the identical 

 stimulus of gravity result from two fundamental reactions : 

 that of Direct Stimulus inducing contraction, and Indirect 

 Stimulus, expansion. Few contributions to vegetable 

 physiology can be of wider application and significance 

 than this great generalisation, which in the phenomenon of 

 life will rank as high as the universal theory of gravitation 

 in the world of matter. 



