152 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [AUGUST 
has the chemistry of true solutions. The importance of surface tension in the 
mechanics of cell life has been emphasized, adsorption phenomena have recently 
become important in our consideration of semipermeability, selective absorption, 
etc., they must also be called upon to explain many of the relations between soil 
and plant. The student of protoplasmic structures, nuclear membranes, chromo- 
somes, fibrillae, and the rest, is perhaps more familiar with coagulation of colloids 
and adsorption than he knows; his killing and fixing are examples of the former, 
while the whole process of staining apparently depends upon the different adsorp- 
tive powers exhibited by various portions of the coagulated protoplasmic mass. 
The so-called Brownian movement and the other phenomena of motion usually 
observed in the protoplasmic emulsion are likewise to be classed under capillary 
chemistry. If enzyme action is to receive an explanation, it bids fair to come 
also from this realm. 
With this book and the field that it represents once in general use, it would 
seem that physiological research should receive a very great impetus along just 
those lines where it now wavers most. One of imagination, who appreciates the 
problems and present rapid advance of this and other branches of physical chem- 
istry, should have little cause so thoroughly to lose heart as to need the aid 0 
those “‘entelechies” and other dei ex machina with which the ‘neo-vitalism” 
seems to be somewhat overburdening biological philosophy. In the present 
exposition of capillary chemistry the author proceeds from the simpler phenomena 
of surface tension and capillarity to subjects of more complex nature, such as 
adsorption, colloidal solutions, suspensions, emulsions, catalysis, and the like. 
Every section is brief, clear, and directly to the point in hand; experimental 
evidence is given prominence rather than theoretical deductions, though the 
latter are not wanting; and numerous footnotes orient the reader in the scattered 
literature of the subject. An index of authors and one of subjects enhances the 
value of the work.—B. E. Lrvincston. 
MINOR NOTICES 
Insect galls.—Miss Stepprns* has published a bulletin on insect galls of 
Springfield, Mass., and vicinity, which will be very useful to botanists who ar 
interested in cecidology. The galls are grouped with reference to the plants, 
which have been arranged in accordance with Brirron’s Manual. This is in 
first American work in which these pathological growths have been grouped 
with reference to the host plants. The record shows 204 species of gall-producins 
insects, which are distributed in 52 genera, 14 families, and 6 orders. The galls 
occur on 93 species of host plants, which are distributed among 48 genet " 
families, and 16 orders. The descriptions of the galls are clear and are reinforced 
by 112 illustrations. The descriptions of the insects are omitted, but the synono™y 
and bibliography given with each will enable the student of entomology to ! 
them up without difficulty. The galls of 26 new species are described and named, 
4 STEBBINS, FANNrE A., Springfield Museum of Natural History, Bulletin 2. 197° 
