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THE AMERICAN BOTANIST 



medical treatment whatever runs its course in about three 

 weeks, and most of these supposed cures owe their reputation 

 to having- been used when the inflammation was subsiding nat- 

 urally. A physician friend, who has made a special study of ivy 

 poisoning, tells me that no specific for the trouble has yet been 

 discovered. The most efficacious remedy known can only re- 

 duce the period of attack from its normal length of about three 

 weeks to one week or ten days. No better cure is known than 

 the application of the alcoholic solution of sugar of lead, the 

 philosophy of this being that the alcohol dissolves the fixed oil 

 which causes the irritation, and the astringent sugar of lead 

 dries up the pustules. The irritating oil is also readily soluble 

 in soap and water, and as it takes some time to produce its ef- 

 fect, if exposed parts are well washed with soap and warni 

 water within two hours of the time of infection, no poisoning 

 will take place. — Chas. Macnamara^ Aniprior, Canada. 



Coloring Matter in Leaves. — Wlienever the scientist 

 investigates a subject he finds it more complex than we 

 imagined it to be — or he makes it so. We used to think that 

 leaves were colored by chlorophyll but we shall have to revise 

 our views if the findings of two investigators recently published 

 in Science prove to be true. In peach leaves they found all of 

 the following : Two forms of chlorophyll, phytorhodin, chloro- 

 phyllin, phaeophytin, phaeophorbide, methyl-phaecphorbide ; 

 methyl-chlorophyllid, phytochlorin, carotin and xanthophyll. 



Odor of Galax Leaves. — The galax {Galax aphylla) 

 whose rounded green or bronze leaves have become well known 

 in recent years through their use in the florist's creations, is 

 reputed to have at times a decidedly rank odor which some 

 Southern writers are inclined to term a ''polecat smell," polecat 

 being the polite Southern expression for a certain black and 

 white nocturnal prowler which can be smelled farther than it 

 can be seen. Another writer has characterized the odor as 

 ''a faint sickly carrion scent." The odor seems to vary in 



