February 26, 1904.] 



SCIENCE. 



337 



distinguished on tlie side of the actual content 

 of their respective practices, nor by using such 

 notions as that of the supernatural, unless 

 they are critically reconstructed with refer- 

 ence to the type of ciilture in which they are 

 applied. It seems more legitimate to differ- 

 entiate magic and religion according to the 

 types of situations within which they ap- 

 pear. Some tensions in the experience of 

 the primitive man are merely occasional and 

 appeal to him chiefly as an individual; others 

 are more general and appeal more insistently 

 to the conscioiisness of the social group. In 

 connection with the former sort of tensions 

 magical practices are developed, and in con- 

 nection with the latter variety religion differ- 

 entiates. James E. Lough, 



Secretary. 



BOTANICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 



The seventeenth regular meeting of the Bo- 

 tanical Society of Washington was held at 

 the Portner Hotel, January 7, 1904. 



Messrs. A. D. Shamel, W. W. Tracy, Sr., 

 Professor C. V. Piper and Professor W. M. 

 Scott were elected to active membership. 



At the close of the business meeting the fol- 

 lowing papers were presented : 



The Identity of American Upland Cotton: 



Mr. L. H. Dewey. 



The common cultivated cotton of the south- 

 ern states is known in American botanical 

 literature as Oossypium herhaceum L. Euro- 

 pean authors, especially in recent years, have 

 referred it to G. hirsutum L. Nearly all 

 authorities agree that the cotton of southern 

 Asia, cultivated in India since the earliest 

 records, also cultivated in southern Europe 

 and known as the Levant cotton, is G. her- 

 haceum. The descriptions of Linnseus do not 

 characterize the species definitely, though 

 ' five-lobed leaves ' applies best to G. her- 

 haceum, and ' acutely three- to five-lobed 

 leaves ' to G. hirsutum^ but the authors cited 

 by Linnseus state clearly that G. hirsutum is 

 the American cotton. 



The name Gossypium herhaceum has evi- 

 dently been applied to American cotton as the 

 result of a misidentification by early American 



authors and the assumption that it originated 

 from seed brought from Europe. American 

 upland cotton is almost certainly of A m erican 

 origin. Both American and Asiatic cottons 

 exhibit a wide variation, but the general char- 

 acters within the limits of variation are suffi- 

 ciently constant to mark them with certainty 

 as distinct species. Gossypium herhaceum 

 has leaves with roundish or broadly acuminate 

 lobes, yellow flowers purple at the base of the 

 petals, toothed bracts and nearly spherical 

 umbonate five-celled bolls to which the lint 

 tenaciously clings. Gossypium hirsutum has 

 acutely lobed leaves, white flowers, turning 

 purple (but rarely with purple at the base of 

 the petals) deeply cleft bracts, and ovate four- 

 to five-celled bolls from which the lint is free 

 at maturity. Tournefourt, in 1700, described 

 it as the ' finest American cotton with greenish 

 seeds'; Linnasus, in 1763, called it Gossypium 

 hirsutum, and this is the name by which it 

 should now be known. 



The Influence of Insoluble Suhstances on the 



Poisonous Action of Aqueous Solutionis on 



Plants: Dr. Eodney H. True. 



The paper by Dr. True, on the effect exerted 

 on the action of poisonous substances by the 

 presence of insoluble bodies in the solutions, 

 presented in a preliminary way the results of 

 a series of experiments, still in progress. 



Finely divided paraffine, quartz sand, filter 

 paper, and other insoluble substances were 

 found to reduce the action of salts of the 

 heavy metals and of certain non-electrolytes 

 by their mere presence. This was explained 

 on the basis of a supposed adsorption of the 

 molecules of the poisonous compound by the 

 surface of the insoluble body. A parallel was 

 pointed out between the rates of growth seen 

 in solutions containing a constant amount of 

 copper sulphate provided with increasing 

 quantity of quartz sand, and the growth rates 

 seen in a series of progressively diluted cop- 

 per sulphate solutions. The effect was similar 

 in both cases, indicating that the insoluble 

 substance in its essential effect removes 

 molecules or ions of the poisonous materials 

 from the free solution. The bearing of this 

 situation on all physiological problems deal- 

 ing with the soil was pointed out and the 



