324 Scientific Intelligence. 



8. Propagation of the sugar-cane. — Director J. H. Wakker, 

 of the experiment station for the study of sugar-cane, in East 

 Java, has published an important communication relative to this 

 matter, which is likely to stimulate further investigation in all 

 cane-producing districts. It is well known that in practice cane 

 is universally propagated from cuttings or their equivalents, and, 

 furthermore, this mode of perpetuation has very naturally 

 resulted in a loss of the power to produce good seeds. Wakker, 

 by prosecuting extensive and exact researches, has found that the 

 power of producing viable seeds is not wholly lost by this plant, 

 but is capable of at least partial restoration by proper selection. 

 Close inspection shows that although a great majority of all the 

 flowers of the cultivated varieties of the cane are practically 

 sterile, it is possible in some instances to find a few scattering 

 blossoms which can be utilized for artificial pollination. At the 

 experiment station in East Java there are between two and three 

 hundred varieties of Saccharum under cultivation, but of these only 

 a very few (in fact only one to any great extent) are employed in 

 Javan agriculture. The principal variety, the so-called " Cheri- 

 bon-cane," does not seed at all, and the same is true of some of 

 the others, but diligent search was rewarded by the discovery 

 that in some good varieties efficient pollen could be obtained, 

 and in some others there were receptive stigmas. The pollina- 

 tion in an illustrative case, namely, that in which Cheribon-cane 

 was used for the female plant, was guarded from foreign influence 

 by the use of a paper covering around the inflorescence. In the 

 year 1893, Wakker obtained from these crosses 669 seedlings of 

 remarkable vigor. From all of his experiments in that year, he 

 procured 490 which had to be subsequently rejected, but he 

 retained 179 of high promise. Most of these possessed a higher 

 percentage of sugar than the parent plants, and were free from 

 disease. 



It is difficult to overestimate the value of these researches. 

 The range of bud-variation in the cane is very wide, but it has 

 seemed to tropical cultivators an almost hopeless task to lead the 

 product of sugar up to a much higher percentage than at present 

 by means of selection among these varieties, whereas it has been 

 felt that if seeds could in any way be had, the initiation of new 

 and more productive variations might reasonably be hoped for. 

 It is understood that no appreciable advance in the process of 

 sugar extraction is to be expected : on the other hand, a path for 

 the successful cultivation of new varieties is now fairly broken 

 and may speedily give us far greater production per acre than 

 has hitherto been thought possible. g. l. g. 



9. Systematic arrangement of Australian Fungi, together with 

 Host-Index and List of Works on the subject ; by D, McAlpine, 

 pp. 236, 4to (Melbourne, 1895). — The rapid development of the 

 study of fungi in Australia is strikingly shown in the present 

 volume by Prof. McAlpine, the government vegetable pathologist 

 of Victoria, issued by the Department of Agriculture. Of the 



