320 Scientific Intelligence. 



by the so-called downward current. Other examples cited by 

 the author are the following: (1) Sympodial leafy shoots, (2) 

 Terminal buds, (3) Axillary buds, (4) Acaulescent plants and 

 clusters of radical leaves. All of the cases to which the author 

 applies his hypothesis seem to be perfectly explicable upon the 

 older view that the water in a plant moves in lines of least re- 

 sistance toward points of consumption or outflow. Thus in the 

 well-known instance of the flow of sap from a maple tree which 

 is tapped, there is undoubtedly, for the time, a descending cur- 

 rent ; but that there is, under normal conditions, anything an- 

 swering to this, is not shown by the experiment in question. It 

 should be said, however, that the author promises a more ex- 

 tended communication upon this subject. g. l. g. 



7. , Certain Coloring Matters in Fungi. W. Zopf (Botan. Zeit., 

 Jan. 4, 1889). — The author adds to the long list of pigments 

 found in fungi a few of great interest. He points out the close 

 similarity which exists between the yellow coloring matters in a 

 few fungi and the yellow colors which are derived from some of 

 the higher plants. From some of the tissues of the fungi in 

 question a fatty coloring matter can be isolated by the process 

 of saponification which was suggested by Ivuhne, and has been 

 successful in other cases ; but from certain bacteria which he 

 studied, although the pigment could be obtained, it could not be 

 procured in a condition of purity. 



In order to settle the question of the relations of light to the 

 formation of this yellow color, the author cultivated for control, 

 the organism in different nutrient liquids and on different nutri- 

 ent solids in the light, using the same organisms on precisely the 

 same substances kept in absolute darkness. After the lapse of 

 about a fortnight, the color was found to be as dense in the lat- 

 ter as in the former case. For completeness in nomenclature the 

 author suggests that these substances, so similar in their relations 

 as regards absorption spectra, a series of terms should be given 

 as anthoxanthin, mycoxanthin and bacterioxanthin. The color- 

 ing matters of plants are, so far as their physiological signifi- 

 cance is concerned, to be regarded as waste products (see Vine's 

 Physiology of Plants, p. 242), which chemically are allied to the 

 aromatic series. Since the fungi have no chlorophyll to begin 

 with, and since, further, these organisms studied by Zopf have 

 the power of producing coloring matters, akin to those of the 

 higher plants, out of colorless substances like gelatin, or agar-agar, 

 some of the pigments must be excluded from the series formerly 

 believed to be products of the degradation of chlorophyll-pig- 

 ment. G. L. G. 



8. The Bacterial Forms found in Normal Stomachs. — J. E. 

 Abelotts (Comptes rendus, cviii, 310, Feb., 1889) reports the results 

 of his studies in the laboratory of Professor Lannegrace. Besides 

 seven forms of microbes previously known, the author adds nine 

 as occurring in the juices of the healthy stomach upon which ex- 

 periments were conducted. Proper care appears to have been 

 exercised to exclude all foreign germs from the apparatus used 



