744 General Notes. [ December, 
Tue Nutrition or Prants. — Sig. Cugini has recently contributed 
to the Nuovo Giornale Botanico Italiano a very elaborate paper on the 
alimentation of cellular plants. In his Text-Book of Botany, Sachs 
arranges the elements which are necessary to the nutrition of plants in 
three series, in the order of their importance, thus : — 
Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen, Sulphur. 
Potassium, Calcium, Magnesium, Iron. 
Phosphorus, Chlorine. 
Cugini would arrange them thus, in five series instead of three : — 
Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen. 
Sulphur. 
” Potassium, Phosphorus. 
Iron, Magnesium, 
on. 
Silic 
The modes in which these elements are combined before they can 
serve for the nutrition of the plant are expressed in the following table 
of the proximate food-materials of plants, — 
Organic carbon-compounds, 
Water, 
An ammoniacal] salt, 
N : r 
ecessaryY 4 Sulphates of potassium and iron, 
fails 
Phosphate of magnesiu 
An alkaline silicate. 
| Chloride é : 
odide pof sodium or potassium, 
Occasional 4 Bromid 
Phosphate, nitrate, or sulphate of calcium, 
Salts of zinc, manganese, and aluminium. 
Potassium the author considers to have an altogether different pae 
tion from that of any other element, and to bear a somewhat similar 
relationship to the carbohydrates to that which phosphorus bears to the 
albuminoids. Calcium he does not regard as an indispensable element. 
Iron must be considered so from its peculiar relationship to the coloring 
matter of chlorophyll. He is unable to assign any special function to 
magnesium, although it appears to be essential. — A. W. BENNETT. 
Tue Revative FERTILITY or Cross-FERTILIZATION AND SELF- 
FERTILIZATION. — It is generally known that Mr. Darwin has in hand 
a special work on this subject, to which he has devoted so much atten- 
tion. In the mean time the botanist who has probably, next to Darwin, 
contributed most to our knowledge of the relation of fertility to the 
mode of fertilization in plants, Professor Delpino, of Italy, has pub- 
lished the results of his own observations. He divides the mode of ferti- 
lization in different plants into the following kinds: (1-) The anthers 
pollinate and fecundate the stigma of.the same hermaphrodite ee 
homoclinic homogamy. (2.) The anthers pollinate and fecundate’ the 
stigma in another flower of the same inflorescence, whether the asian ) 
are hermaphrodite, unisexual, or polygamous: homocephalic homp 
(8.) The anthers of one flower pollinate and fecundate the sogen od 
flower belonging to a different inflorescence on the same individual, 
whether hermaphrodite, unisexual, or polygamous; mon@cvous han 
