USE OF ETHER AXD CHLOROFORM FOR FORCING SHRUBS. 45 



ON THE USE OF ETHER AND CHLOROFORM FOR THE 

 FORCING OF SHRUBS, AND OF LILACS IN PAR- 

 TICULAR. 



By Emile Lemoine, F.R.H.S. 



Fok some years there have often been questions in the horticultural 

 papers about the forcing of plants with the aid of ether, and a certain 

 number of experiments have been made in different countries with a view 

 of utilising this new process. It is not my intention to communicate to 

 you the result of my own personal experiences, but I think an account of 

 the principal work done as regards the action of ether and chloroform on 

 plant life may perhaps be of interest. Most of these experiments are-, 

 given in the German papers, Gartenflora and Moller's Gartner zeitung, 

 and in the French Le Jardin, and many other horticultural papers have 

 reproduced them. The inventor of this process, Dr. Johannsen, described 

 his first experiences, and the theoretical idea suggested by them, in 

 several Danish works, and in a treatise published in German in 1900 ; * 

 more recently Mons. Albert Maumene, professor of horticulture at 

 Paris, has summed up in an interesting little book f the actual state of 

 the question. 



The action of amesthetics on vegetable life was formerly studied by 

 Claude Bernard, who, wishing to record the phenomena common to animal 

 and plant life, submitted both to the action of anaesthetics such as ether 

 and chloroform ; thus he put under a bell-glass a specimen of the Sensitive 

 Plant (Mimosa pudica) with a small sponge dipped in ether : at the end 

 of twenty to twenty-five minutes the leaves, being expanded, had become 

 insensible, and no longer shut themselves up when touched ; when replaced 

 in a normal atmosphere the Sensitive Plant recovered its sensibility at the 

 end of a more or less lengthy period. For Claude Bernard this experiment 

 had no other interest than to prove the identity of the characteristics of 

 the protoplasm in the vegetable kingdom with that of the animal, since 

 the effect of anaesthetics was the same in both kingdoms. 



Inspired by the researches of Claude Bernard, Dr. W. Johannsen, pro- 

 fessor at the Danish High School of Agriculture, tried, in 1890, the effect 

 of ether on plants, and on November 17, 1893, he was able to show at 

 the Royal Academy of Sciences, Copenhagen, the first flowers of Lilac 

 forced by means of etherisation. The following are the theoretical 

 considerations by which Dr. Johannsen was induced to undertake his 

 experiments. 



One recognises in the greater number of plants a period of repose,, 

 more or less marked, and another of active growth. The period of repose 

 is produced by internal causes which have, so far, escaped the researches 



* Das Aetherverfahren beim Friihtrcibcn, mit besonderer Beriicksichtigung der 

 Flicdertrciberei, Jena, 1900. 



f Kouvelle Mithode de Culture forcde dcs arbnstcs ct desplantes soumis d V action 

 do V ether ct du chloroformc, Paris, 1903. 



