MANUAL FOR SUGAR GROWERS. 



All vegetable structures are built up of minute 

 cells of very various shape. The simplest cell is a 

 chamber whose walls are thin and 

 usually has fluid contents : these 

 cells joined together form a tissue, 

 and aggregates of different tissues 

 form the root, stem, and leaves, 

 the three portions of which plants 

 consist. In order to study these 

 cells the microscope must be em- 

 ployed. A thin slice of the soft 

 part of the sugar-cane, cut length- 

 wise, presents the appearance 

 shown in Fig. 1, where it will be 

 seen that the greater portion of 

 the stem is composed of cells 

 which are of about the same 

 length as breadth, with thin walls, 

 and having, as seen in section, a 



FIG. 1. Fibro-vascular 

 bundles in sugar-cane ; 

 a, longi t u d i n a 1 ; b, 

 transverse section. 



honeycomb -like appearance; 

 these are usually spoken of as 

 cells ordinary cells, without 

 any qualifying term. Travers- 

 ing this cellular tissue will be 

 seen a number of thread-like 

 cells running parallel with each 

 other ; a closer inspection, on 

 magnifying these threads to a 

 greater degree, as seen in Fig. 

 2, shows that the thread-like 

 cells are not all alike. Some are tubes with thin 

 walls, having rings arranged on the inside of the 



FIG. 2. Fibro-vascular bun- 

 dles in sugar-cane ; a, fibres ; 

 &, vessels. 



