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and may prescribe certain rays for early life, others 

 for adult, or combinations for specially developing 

 the starchy, saccharine, woody, or other substances 

 in the plants; or we may hasten or retard the 

 ripening of crops to suit the varying conditions of 

 the market. 



While it is stated by careful investigators that 

 plants do not seem to need rest at night, yet further 

 study of them under the influence of the electric 

 light may put us in possession of facts which will 

 enable us to give them their light-stimulus at the 

 proper times and for the exact length of time, in 

 addition to giving it of the right strength and color. 

 The fact that diastase, which transforms starch into 

 sugar, acts best in the absence of light, seems to 

 argue that the leaves of plants, which make starch 

 in the presence of light, should have periods of 

 darkness to permit this transformation to go on 

 satisfactorily; otherwise the leaves may become 

 choked with starch, and the plant, although it has 

 an abundance of starchy food, suffer because it 

 cannot utilize it in the presence of continuous light. 

 Some observers warn us not to give the light too 

 freely at noonday, or when the heat is greatest, 

 and others suggest that alternations in the dosage 

 are of value; we have before made mention of the 

 effects of heliotropism. 



When one thinks of the combinations which can 

 be made of the methods of furnishing electricity to 

 the soil and to plants with the methods of furnishing 

 electric light to the leaves of plants, he feels how 

 little indeed has been accomplished, and sees ahead 



