General Notices. 301 



Spaniards on the New World. The indigenes appear to have used only 

 maize, the Chenopodium Quinoa, the potato, and the O'xalis tuberosa, or oka. 

 Barley-meal constitutes, at present, the chief article of their diet ; for bread, 

 though cheap, scarcely falls within their scanty resources. Oats and rye are, 

 as yet, unknown, though well adapted to many of the poorer soils, especially 

 the sandy tracts round Ambato and E,io Bamba. The same cause which pre- 

 vents the perfection of European fruit, limits the number of those of native 

 growth. About the elevation of Quito we find none wild but the capuli, a 

 species of blackberry ; and, on sandy soils, the tuna. Currants, gooseberries, 

 and raspberries seem adapted to the climate, but have not yet been intro- 

 duced. Strawberries are abundant ; but they are probably natives of Chili. 

 Pears and apples are plentiful, but small and ill-flavoured. The celebrated 

 peaches of Ambato remind the European traveller less of the likeness than of 

 the difl^erence. Pine- apples, cherimoyas, oranges, limes, aguacatis (Laurus 

 Persica), granadilla (Passiflora ?), and other tropical fruits, are brought from 

 the adjacent valleys or calientes, but, it may be supposed, little improved by 

 the journey. The idea of perpetual spring is pleasing to the imagination ; but 

 the reality is purchased in the Andes by the want of those glowing forms and 

 colours which nature sheds over tropical climates, while the monotony of earth 

 and sky, scarcely observable by the traveller, would be gladly exchanged by 

 the less fortunate resident for the varied interest of European seasons." 

 (^Hooker's Journal of Botany.) 



Effect of Light which has joassed through coloured Glass oi Plants. — I planted 

 in a box some curled cress seed, and so arranged bottles of carmine fluid, 

 chromate of potassa, acetate of copper, and the ammonia sulphate, that all 

 but a small space of the earth was exposed to light, which had permeated 

 three fourths of an inch of these media. For some days the only apparent 

 difference was, that the earth continued damp under the green and blue fluids, 

 whereas it rapidly dried under the red and yellow. The piumula burst the 

 cuticle in the blue and green lights, before any change was evident in the other 

 parts. After ten days, under the blue fluid there was a crop of cress, of as 

 bright a green as any which grew in full light, and far more abundant. The 

 crop was scanty under the green fluid, and of a pale unhealthy colour. Under 

 the yellow solution, but two or three plants appeared, yet they were less pale 

 than those which had grown in green light. Beneath the red bottle the number 

 of plants which grew was also small, although rather more than in the spot 

 the yellow covered. They, too, were of an unhealthy colour. I now re- 

 versed the order of the bottles, fixing the red in the place of the blue, and the 

 yellow in that of the green. After a few days' exposure, the healthy cress 

 appeared blighted, while a few more unhealthy plants began to show them- 

 selves, from the influence of the blue rays, in the spot originally subjected to 

 the red. It is evident from this that the red and yellow rays not merely 

 retard germination, but positively destroy the vital principle in the seed. Pro- 

 longed exposure uncovered, with genial warmth, free air, and indeed all that 

 can induce growth, fails to revive the blighted vegetation. I have repeated 

 the experiment many times, varying the fluids, but the results have been the 

 same. At this time, I have the above facts strikingly exemplified where the 

 space covered by the bichromate of potassa is without a plant. These results 

 merit the attention of those who are engaged in the study of vegetable 

 economy. Do they not point at a process by which the productions of climes 

 more redolent of light than ours may be brought in this island to their native 

 perfection? Dr. Draper's " experiments," Philosophical Magazine, Veb. 1840, 

 appear at variance with mine. Under the influence of a nearly tropical sun 

 permeating half an inch of solution of the bichromate of potassa, cress grew of 

 a green colour, whilst it took five days to give a sensitive paper a faint yellow 

 green colour. From this. Professor Draper argues the existence of two 

 classes of rays, a different class being necessary to produce the green colouring 

 of vegetable foliage from that which darkens chloride of silver. With sub- 

 mission to one whose facihties for such enquiries are so much greater than my 



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