618 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XL VI. No. 1199 



success) to describe its structure. "We know it is 

 more than merely a chemical compound. It is a 

 historical substance. A watch, as such, is not. 

 The metal and parts of which a watch is made, 

 have, it is true, a past history; but the watch 

 comes from the hands of its maker de novo, with- 

 out any past history as a watch. But not so the 

 plant cell. It has an ancestry as a cell; its proto- 

 plasm has what we may call a physiological mem- 

 ory of the past. It is what it is, not merely be- 

 cause of its present condition, but because its an- 

 cestral cells have had certain experiences. We 

 can never understand a plant protoplast merely by 

 studying it; we must know something of its gene- 

 alogy and its past history. 



It will be noted that althougli a physiolo- 

 gist in outlook, he has properly emphasized 

 the historical and structural point of view so 

 often and so deplorably neglected by the cul- 

 tivators of disembodied plant physiology. 

 The author obviously considers that living 

 matter is to be studied in vita rather than in 

 vitro (whether in glass models or merely in 

 chemical glassware). By his broad outlook 

 he has avoided the narrows which lead, on the 

 one hand, into the ancient Scylla of syste- 

 matic botany, or, on the other, into the more 

 modern Charybdis of plant physiology. 



The book is admirably printed on thin 

 paper, so that its more than six hundred 

 pages and well over four hundred illustrations 

 make a conveniently thin and flexible volume, 

 which is rendered still more useful by soft 

 covers and rounded corners. The illustra- 

 tions, whether original or borrowed, are for 

 the most part good, and in some instances are 

 of striking excellence. An adequate amount 

 of space is given to the important themes of 

 genetics and evolution, while the historical 

 side is not neglected. Dr. Gager's work 

 should be in the hands of every teacher of 

 botanical science, and by its broadness and 

 balance is admirably adapted for use in 

 schools where the one-sided teaching of the 

 facts of botany is by necessity and common 

 sense excluded. The general text is accom- 

 panied by a laboratory guide, which is in- 

 geiiiously contrived to avoid repetition and 

 equally emphasizes structure and function. 

 E. C. Jeffrey 



SPECIAL ARTICLES 



WHY CHLOROFORM IS A MORE POWERFUL 



AND DANGEROUS ANESTHETIC 



THAN ETHER 



Any one accustomed to administering an- 

 esthetics has observed that the amount of 

 chloroform necessary to produce deep narcosis 

 is less than that of ether; also that the period 

 between slight and deep anesthesia is shorter 

 and the lethal dose smaller with chloroform 

 than with ether. These differences in the 

 effects of ether and chloroform led Hewitt to 

 state in his book on "Anesthetics" that 

 chloroform is seven or eight times more power- 

 ful as an anesthetic than ether. In chloro- 

 form poisoning it is known that many of the 

 organs, particularly the liver, are very seri- 

 ously injiu-ed, while it is more difficult, or im- 

 possible in many instances, to produce such 

 injuries with ether. 



It is now recognized that in both chloroform 

 and ether anesthesia oxidation is decreased or 

 rendered defective, as is indicated by the de- 

 creased oxygen intake and carbon dioxide out- 

 put and the appearance of certain incompletely 

 oxidized substances such as /?-oxybutyric and 

 diacetic acids, and acetone. The decreased 

 oxidation in anesthesia with resulting acidosis 

 is much more likely to occm: and to a much 

 greater extent with chloroform than with 

 ether. 



Using practically all the means by which it 

 is known that oxidation can be increased in 

 an animal, as, for example, by food, by in- 

 creasing the amount of work, by fight, or by 

 thyroid feeding, we have found that there is 

 always an accompanying increase in catalase, 

 an enzyme in the tissues which possesses the 

 property of liberating oxygen from hydrogen 

 peroxide. We have also decreased, or rendered 

 defective, the oxidative processes in animals, 

 as, for example, by decreasing the amount of 

 work, by starvation, by phosphorus poisoning, 

 or by extirpation of the pancreas, thus pro- 

 ducing diabetes, and have found that there is 

 always a corresponding decrease in catalase. 

 From these results it was concluded that it is 

 probable that catalase is the enzyme in. the 

 body principally responsible for oxidation. 



