oe ee ee ee a eee er ee en 
LO RI TOT en ae 
1909] CURRENT LITERATURE 239 
from plants in coarse than in fine soils; and that a “bog xerophyte,” Scirpus 
lacustris, loses about twice as much water as Helianthus annuus, on account of 
its loose structure, the air spaces being estimated at 80 per cent. of the total volume 
and the internal surface as 15 times the external.—C. R. B. 
Anthocyan.—On the vexed question of the formation of anthocyan, ComBEs 
furnishes‘? first a very clear and compact summary of the previous researches. 
e then demonstrated that the close relations between the accumulation of 
carbohydrates and the formation of anthocyan, pointed out by the researches 
of OverToN and Mo iiarp on artificially nourished plants, exist also in nature, 
however the pigmentation is provoked. The insoluble carbohydrates behave 
differently, according to the occasion of the pigmentation; but the sugars, gluco- 
sides, and dextrins behave alike : all cases, the two former varying in amount 
directly as the anthocyan, the dextrins diminishing as the sugars and glucosides 
increase. The foncluble aie consequently, appear not to share 
directly in the formation of the red pigment. Comes concludes that the antho- 
cyans, which are probably cyclic glucosides, are formed at the expense of neither 
preexistent sugars and glucosides nor chromogens, but arise at the same time 
as other glucosides, as part of the general accumulation of such bodies.—C. R. B. 
Chlorophyll bodies.—Morphological distinctions between chlorophyll bodies, 
found in a great number and variety of plants, have been pointed out by D’ARBAU- 
MONT,'3 who divides them into two categories, chloroplasts and pseudochloro- 
Plasts. The former, held to be morphologically superior, seem to include the 
bodies usually recognized under that name, without admixture of the latter, 
om which they are distinguished by not swelling in water (at least im situ), 
and by not being stained, with rare exceptions, by acid aniline blue. The pseudo- 
chloroplasts, on the contrary, usually swell in water and become vividly colored 
in the stain, They are of four types, all small, more or less varied in shape, 
with different degrees of green coloration, and variously intermixed. The mem- 
bers of the two categories are formed in the same way, either with or without 
the cooperation of starch,'4 and both, without reference to their mode of origin, 
may or may not form starch.—C. R. B. 
ro re of Symplocarpus.—In an investigation of Symplocarpus pres 
RosENDAHL'S has obtained the following results: the primordia sea 
pein se 
‘? ComBes, R., Rapports entre les composés ae et Ja formation de 
grates Ann. Sci. Nat. Bot. IX. 9275-303. 1909 
3 D’ARBAUMONT, J., Nouvelle contribution a l’é conte des corps chlorophylliens. 
Nes Sci. Nat. Bot. IX. 9: 197-229 
'4Cf. Betzune, E., Nouvelles vitae sur l’origine des grains d’amidon et 
des grains 7 paar Ann. Sci. Nat. Bot. VII. 13:17. 1891; Jour. de Bot. 
9: we To2. 1895. 
OSENDAHL, C. Orro, Embryo sac development and embryology nee 
espa Minn. Bot. Studies 4':1-9. pls. I-3- 1999- 
