238 FREAKS OF PLANT LIFE. 



fessor Caspary, on the effect of extreme cold in 

 producing movements in the branches of trees in 

 frosty weather. The amount of motion seems to 

 be directly proportionate to the intensity of the cold, 

 but how it is produced has not yet been explained. 1 



M. Lecoq has also described certain rhythmical 

 tremors in the leaves of Colocasia esculenta, to which 

 Dr. Masters has directed attention. These are stated 

 to occur at intervals, the plant in the meantime being 

 perfectly at rest ; so violent are the vibrations that 

 on one occasion the pot in which the plant was 

 growing shook so violently that it could with diffi- 

 culty be steadied. This statement has also been 

 confirmed by another observer. The emission of 

 water from a pore near the apex of the leaf has 

 been occasionally observed in this plant, and it has 

 been suggested that the tremors may have been 

 occasioned by the efforts of the plant to rid itself 

 of the water. But, as Dr. Masters remarks, it is 

 certain that in many cases no such aperture is visible 

 in the plant in question, and that the emission of 

 water is not by any means a common phenomenon. 2 



1 Caspary in " Report of Proceedings of Botanical Congress 

 of London in 1866," p. 98. 



3 " Popular Science Review, 1 ' vii., p. 25. Limnocharis 

 Humboldtii is said to have also a terminal pore at the apex of 

 each leaf from which superabundant moisture drains off. 



