390 Chronicles of Science. [July, 



Flora a score of new lichens, of which six are entirely new to 

 lichenology, and also a new species of Sphoeria — thus proving that 

 our Welsh mountains, if thoroughly searched, would yield an 

 abundant harvest of good, rare, and novel lichens, and probably 

 many novelties in other natural orders. Dr. Fraser, who accom- 

 panied Mr. Leighton, adds a list of more than fifty species of 

 mosses, which he found near Dolgelly, chiefly on Cader Idris. 



Protophyta. — While botanists generally and students of Diato- 

 niaceae especially must feel the loss of so ardent an observer as the 

 late Dr. Greville, it is gratifying to find that others are coming for- 

 ward in his especial field of research. In the last number of the 

 ' Microscopical Journal,' Dr. Lauder Lindsay describes some new 

 species of Diatomaeeae and Desmidiaceae from New Zealand, and 

 makes some valuable remarks upon the distribution of the Proto- 

 phyta, and their representatives in New Zealand. The Rev. Eugene 

 O'Meara, in the same journal, describes eleven new and several rare 

 forms of Diatomacea3 which were dredged on the west coast of 

 Ireland, by Dr. E. Perceval Wright, of Dublin. The gathering is 

 chiefly interesting on account of the number and rarity of the 

 known species and the large percentage of new species. 



France. — Spontaneous Movements in Colocasia. — M. Lecoq 

 communicates to the ' Comptes Eendus ' a notice of some extraordi- 

 nary vibrations which he has observed to occur regularly in the 

 leaves of the Colocasia esculenta. The movements were sufficiently 

 violent to set small bells ringing which were attached to the plant, 

 and thus indicated to M. Lecoq the time of the phenomenon. The 

 vibrations were from 100 to 120 a minute. The plant was kept in 

 a hothouse, and was quite free from draughts or currents of air, 

 which could produce the agitations observed. M. C. Musset pub- 

 lished some observations on this plant some time since ; he did not 

 observe the movements of the leaves, but noted that during praefo- 

 liation the sap was projected from the leaves to a distance of several 

 centimetres through two orifices, in the form of stomata, situated at 

 the apex of the leaf. Eighty-five drops were projected in the 

 minute. The most probable explanation of the movements offered 

 by M. Lecoq is that in his plant, for some reason or other, since he 

 did not observe any projection of sap, the terminal orifices were 

 inactive, and that the projecting force was thus converted into a 

 vibrating force. 



Germany. — The Function of Chlorophyll in the Chemistry of 

 Plant Life. — Dr. Ferdinand Cohn, of Breslau, in a paper " On the 

 Phycochromacese and Floridese" in the January number of the 

 'Archiv fiir Mikroskopische Anatomie,' describes at some length 

 the colouring matters of various low forms of Algae. He shows 

 that the colouring matter in all — red, blue, green, yellow, or 

 brown — contains Chlorophyll, or a closely- allied body, and main- 



