UNE 12, 1890] 



NATURE 



157 



Is there any commingling of the elements of stock and 

 of scion in the case of grafts ? Botanists and gardeners, 

 almost without exception, have asserted that there is 

 none. Place on a sheet of wet blotting-paper, which 

 may represent the stock, a drier piece of the same sub- 

 stance, which may represent the graft, and there will be 

 a passage of the fluid from the lower to the upper paper, 

 but there will be no mixture of the constituents of the 

 two. 



We have always wondered, if there were no reciprocal 

 influence of stock on scion, why grafting is practiced at 

 all, because we cannot understand the acknowledged ad- 

 vantages of the practice except upon the supposition of 

 some modification being exerted. Gardeners triumphantly, 

 as they were quite justified in doing, pointed to the millions 

 upon millions of cases where no such modifications are 

 visible. Botanists pointed to the closed cells from whose 

 cavities only the thinnest of liquids could exude and per- 

 meate through the walls of adjoining cells. This was 

 before the days of " continuity of protoplasm," as above 

 mentioned. Now that we know that not only water, but 

 protoplasm itself, may, under certain circumstances, pass 

 from cell to cell, the difficulties in the way of conceiving 

 that any influence could be exerted on the scion by the 

 stock, or vice versd, are very materially lessened, if not 

 entirely removed. 



But before the time we speak of, there were some 

 alleged facts which, provided the history given were true, 

 could only be explained on the supposition of the com- 

 mingling of elements by grafting and subsequent separa- 

 tion. In other words, the possibility of graft-hybridization 

 must be assumed. Whether it has been proved is another 

 matter. 



One of the strongest cases in its favour that we know of 

 is that of the famous Adams's Laburnum {Cytisus Adami). 

 We cannot go into detail as to the history of this extra- 

 ordinary tree. It must suffice to say, that it is stated to 

 have originated from the implantation of a bud of the 

 dwarf, shrubby, lilac-flowered Cytisus purpureus on to the 

 i common Laburnum. Be this as it may, we have in our 



\ gardens on this side of the Atlantic trees which every 

 I year astonish the beholder by producing, together with the 



foliage and flowers of the Laburnum, tufts of Cytisus 

 purpureus 2lX\A all sorts of intermediate conditions between 

 the two. If the stock exerted no influence on the scion, 

 the buds should be pure Cytisus purpureus and pure C. 

 Laburnum, without any intermediate forms. It would lead 

 me too far to give other illustrations of the production of 

 shoots of an intermediate character between stock and 

 scion. Many such are on record, and many have come 

 under my own notice. It must suffice for me to show 

 that whilst we may, with a very great amount of prob- 

 ability, attribute the existence of some sports to the 

 " un-mixing " of elements blended by means of cross- 

 fertilization, whether between species (hybrids) or between 

 varieties (cross-bred s), we may, likewise, but with a less 

 degree of probability, attribute the existence of others to 

 a similar dissociation in the case of grafted plants. 



Obviously the latter cases must be much less numerous 

 than the former, and are purely artificial productions, 

 not likely to occur in Nature. 



Other assigned causes appear to me to pertain rather 

 to variation in general than to that limited, localized form 

 of it which is here considered as bud-variation, and may 

 be here passed with the mere mention. 



Maxwell T. Masters. 



A NEW SCIENTIFIC SERIAL} 

 'T'HE imposing series of four octavo volumes before us 

 ■*■ is the embodiment of the first five years' work in 

 the new Museum of the Austrian capital. Of the nature 



I "Annalen derk.k. Naturhistorischen Hofmuseums, Wien." Bd I.-IV 

 i88€-39 (Wien, Alf. H5lder.) 



and plan of the building itself our readers have already 

 been made aware ; the collections housed within it are 

 rich in types and specimens of priceless value, and its 

 affairs are administered by a large and efficient staff of 

 specialists, many of whom have attained a world-wide 

 reputation. The directorship lies in the hands of Dr. 

 Franz Ritter von Hauer. 



Each of these volumes consists of four parts, and 

 embraces one year's work. The parts are issued 

 quarterly, their limitation in size being determined by 

 the progress of work in hand. The first part of the 

 first volume, issued early in the year 1886, is exclusively 

 a " Jahresbericht " for the preceding year. It has already 

 received notice in our pages (Nature, vol. xxxiii. p. 424). 

 While for the most part a report of work done, it 

 contains information concerning the Museum itself, to- 

 gether with a list of names of the officers and staff, and 

 of the various donors, correspondents, and persons who 

 studied in the Museum during the year, as of those to 

 whom material had been lent, together with references to 

 published works in the production of which the resources 

 of the Museum had been utilized. Of the remaining 

 fifteen parts, each contains one or more special treatises, 

 together with "notices" of a miscellaneous character, 

 correspondence, personalia, and administrative detail, 

 with acknowledgments of acquisitions. The four volumes 

 make up a total of over 1900 pages of closely printed 

 matter, with 80 plates and numerous woodcuts. The 

 illustrations are, for the most part, highly satisfactory ; we 

 would, however, have preferred the substitution of ordinary 

 lithographs for the photographs of Ophiurids described 

 in vol. ii. ; the latter are too indefinite and unsatisfactory. 

 Excluding the notices and miscellanea, which monopolize 

 collectively 22 per cent. (415 pp.) of the printed sheets, 

 there remain 1532 pages of a more solid nature, which 

 make up the bulk of the collective volumes. These bear, 

 in all, 55 treatises ; some of them, as our pages have 

 already borne testimony (Nature, vol. xxxv. p. 204), are 

 lists of types and specimens in the Museum, others are 

 elaborate monographs dealing with highly involved struc- 

 tural detail. The Museum is divided into five departments, 

 each having its own working staff, and the published works 

 bear the following ratio : zoology, 23 ; mineralogy with 

 petrography, 1 3 ; geology with palaeontology, 9 : botany, 7 ; 

 anthropology and ethnology, 3. As might be expected from 

 this list, many new species of organic beings have been de- 

 scribed. We find much to admire in some of the mono- 

 graphs ; and especial attention is demanded by those 

 devoted to the ethnology of the South Sea Islanders, by 

 Dr. Otto Finsch, and to the artistic products of the 

 Dyaks, by Prof. Alois Raimond Hein. These memoirs 

 extend over the greater portion (240 pp.) of an average 

 volume, and they are amply illustrated ; the information 

 contained in them is of inestimable value, the illustrations 

 are of rare merit, and it would be difficult indeed to sur- 

 pass the coloured representations of Papuan handiwork 

 which adorn the pages of Dr. Finsch's important com- 

 munication. These monographs are based upon the 

 collections in the Vienna Museum, and upon perusal of 

 them we know not upon which of their acquisitions most 

 to congratulate our Austrian confreres — those of types of 

 Nature's productions, or those of objects of human artifice. 

 Moreover, the appearance of the memoirs cited, now that 

 the South Sea Islanders are receiving renewed attention, 

 is most timely ; and their value is greatly increased by the 

 fact that the peoples to whom they relate are becoming 

 demoralized and demolished by the advance of " civiliza- 

 tion." 



The Museum whence these Annalen emanate was 

 opened to the public in August 1889 by " His Apostolic 

 Majesty the Emperor" ; and an account of the ceremony, 

 with its attendant honours, is to be found in vol. iv. The 

 pages of the journal show the custodians of the institu- 

 tion to be fully alive to the value of their charge. The 



NO. 1076, VOL. 42] 



