176 THE BOTAy I' AL MAGAZINE [Vol. xxvn. No. sa. 



• 



From the foregoing results and conclusions, it is then evi- 

 dent that magnesium sulphate, in the absence of other salts, is 

 not necessarily injurious in its effects, but on the other hand 

 may be highly beneficial ; while any inhibitory action is due to 

 the presence of a relatively large proportion of magnesium in 

 the solution." 



From the preceding investigations, it will be observed that 

 the salts act on the growth of young seedlings as toxic or 

 stimulating agent according to their concentrations. 



In regard to the influence of these salts upon the growth of 

 the rice plant, which is the most important crop in our count- 

 ry, a special investigation has not been made to date. But, in 

 1909 the widely distributed alkali soils were discoverd by Prof. 

 Dr. K. Oshima and K. Shibuya, the chemist of Formosa Govern- 

 ment, in the southern part of Formosa and now it has become 

 a most important subject to study in detail. We undertook 

 this study under the suggestion of Prof. Dr. K. Oshima, to find 

 out the influence of the alkali salts upon the growth of rice 

 seedlings, and selected magnesium sulphate, magnesium chloride, 

 calcium chloride, sodium sulphate, sodium chloride, sodium 

 carbonate and bicarbonate as the salts to be examined. 



Experiment I. 



In the first experiment wc began with the young rice seed- 

 lings, 15-1 G mm. high, which were grown, in distilled water 

 from seeds which were almost uniform in size and specific 

 gravity (1.2—1.25). 56 beakers of about 5.5 cm. diameter and 



1 • • rn f 1 1 1 1 1 



7 cm. deep, each containing 50 cc. of y, -^-, -^-, -^^-, -^^ , 



— , — — . . molecular solution of each salt mention- 



1000' 2000' 10000 



ed above, were used for the experiment, the seedlings being 

 placed in the solution on Aug. 3rd (1911), and one beaker with 

 distilled water as control. Twenty live seedlings were grown 

 in each culture at ordinary temperature and the evaporated 

 water was supplemented with distilled water from time to time 

 to keep (lie solutions always in their original concentrations. 



