July 19. [883] 



NATURE 



267 



beard ; you did not. I am grateful. But if I could only 

 say that you had eaten my charm, ah — then ! ' ' Well,' I 

 replied, ' say so if you like,' and our interview ended" 

 (p. 291). 



Like most Europeans who have lived long amongst 

 them, our author learnt to regard with very kindly 

 feelings the simple-minded natives who with all their 

 faults are endowed with many noble qualities of head and 

 heart. The Persian is here described as " hospitable 

 and obliging, as honest as the general run of mankind, 

 and especially well disposed towards the foreigner. 

 Home virtues amongst the Persians are many. He is 

 very kind and indulgent to his children, and as a son 

 his respect for both parents is excessive. But the full 

 stream of his love and reverence is reserved for his 

 mother; and an undutiful son or daughter is hardly ever 

 known in the country" (p. 314). Here of course follows 

 a flood of anecdotes, some of which serve also to illus- 

 trate the character of the Armenians, of whom he has 

 little good to say. " I will not trust myself," he writes, 

 "to give my opinion of the Armenians. Of course I have 

 known brilliant exceptions ; but when I say that I indorse 

 all that Morier, Malcolm, Lady Shiel, and the standard 

 writers on Persia have said of these people, I need not 

 add that my impression is unfavourable in the extreme. 

 They possess one good quality, however, thrift" (p. 316). 

 In a work professing to give little more than personal 

 experiences, valuable because derived from a lengthy 

 residence in every part of the country, it would be unfair 

 to look for any systematic information regarding the 

 physical features, products, or natural resources of the 

 land. Nevertheless, many useful details connected with 

 these points occur here and there, and the statements 

 made regarding the abundance and extraordinary cheap- 

 ness of good provisions in all the fertile provinces would 

 seem to justify the conclusion that Persia is not yet quite 

 " played out." Cheese and butter at twopence a pound, 

 flour and bread at a penny in the towns and much less in 

 villages, eggs at ninepence per four or five dozen, quails 

 and partridges at fourpence a brace, hares at fourpence 

 each, lamb and mutton at proportionately low rates, make 

 Persia "the poor man's paradise, in fact, to live in, the 

 cheapest country in the world" (p. 298). 



The work is furnished with a convenient glossary 

 and an index, which contains some rather amusing 

 entries ; but there are neither maps nor illustrations 

 beyond a solitary chnpper-khana (posthouse) facing the 

 title-page. But no such attractions were needed to render 

 the " Land of the Lion and Sun" a far more entertain- 

 ing book than most of our fashionable three-volume 

 novels. A. H. Keane 



CHLOROPHYLL CORPUSCLES AND PIGMENT 

 BODIES IN PLANTS 



Ueber die Entwickelung der Chlorophyllkbrner und 

 Farbkbrper. By A. W. F. Schimper. (Bot. Zeitung, 

 1883.) 



Ueber Chlorophyllkbrner, Starkcbildner und Farbkbrper. 

 By A. Meyer. {Bot. Centralblatt, 1S82.) 



CONTRIBUTIONS to a more exact knowledge of the 

 contents of the vegetable cell have increased of late 

 to an extent which justifies the hope that some generalisa- 



tion of the facts may before long be possible ; meanwhile> 

 botanists must have experienced a feeling akin to dismay 

 at the scattered condition of much of the literature, and 

 the apparent hopelessness of collating the facts dealing 

 with normal and abnormal cell contents. The works of 

 Strasburger, Schmitz, Schimper, and others have already 

 cleared the way to a better comprehension of many 

 details, especially with regard to the cell nucleus and 

 starch grains ; but with each step it has been felt that the 

 pushing back of the phenomena towards a common cause 

 has raised other difficulties hitherto unforeseen. 



In the isolated position of such structures as chloro- 

 phyll grains and pigment corpuscles as unexplained cell 

 contents, we have an illustration of wide significance in 

 this connection, and the attempt to bring all such bodies 

 as these and the "starch-forming corpuscles" of Schimper 

 into definite relationship one with another must be wel- 

 comed as promising much simplification of nomenclature 

 and discussion, the more so, since these relationships are 

 now shown to be genetic, and therefore real. Schimper 

 in Bonn, and A. Meyer in Strasburg, proceeding inde- 

 pendently, have arrived at the conclusion that the chloro- 

 phyll corpuscles, "starch-forming corpuscles," and pig- 

 ment bodies of the higher plants are simply the more or 

 less modified and mature conditions of certain minute 

 protoplasmic structures found together with the nucleus 

 in the youngest cells of any meristem. 



Whereas botanists have assumed that chlorophyll 

 grains, starch-formers, nuclei, &c, are produced free in 

 the protoplasm of the cell, we are now called upon to note 

 that such is not the case ; but that these bodies arise from 

 distinct structures present in the young cell from its 

 earliest existence, and that any pigment (green or other- 

 wise), starch grains (directly assimilated or not), &c, 

 found in connection with the structures named, arise by 

 later changes in the substance of the protoplasmic cor- 

 puscles produced by continuous growth and division of 

 the few, minute "plastids" found in the young cell. 



Meyer and Schimper agree in all essential points re- 

 garding the relationship and development of these bodies, 

 and the slight differences in details and nomenclature 

 between the two investigators in no way affect the main 

 question. 



To quote an example, we may take Schimper's descrip- 

 tion of the development of the pigment bodies occurring 

 in the flower of Hemeroca/lis fulva. The cells of the 

 perigone contain brick-red crystalline needles or three- 

 pointed tablets, which arise as follows : — 



In the very young flower bud, the cells contain, besides the 

 nucleus and cell-protoplasm, minute bodies which Schimper 

 names plastidia — a general term for these bodies in all 

 meristems, and independent of any function afterwards 

 performed by them. When the flower bud is already 

 green the plastidia nearest the light have acquired a dis- 

 tinct green colour, and function, no doubt, as chlorophyll 

 corpuscles ; all such green plastidia are called by 

 Schimper chloroplastidia. The plastidia in the cells 

 more deeply situated, however, remain pale, and may be 

 called leukoplastidia. All stages intermediate between 

 leukoplastidia and chloroplastidia occur. The small lenti- 

 cular chloroplastidia increase in size, become flatter, and 

 divide as the cell grows. They then become narrower 

 and pointed, some becoming needle- or spindle-shaped 



