298 
September 27, 1894. 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
arguments bearing on side issues and those brought to bear on the 
main question. Note the side issue re condensed steam after Mr. 
Gilmour’s frank and full retraction how persistently Mr. Bishop con¬ 
tinues to beat the big drum as if he had scored a decisive victory all 
along the line. 
Again, what need to douht the intelligence of your readers with 
diffusive and unnecessary encyclopasdian definitions only worthy a 
second-year pupil teacher to a third standard class of pupils, all this 
interspersed into column after column of scientific fireworks to prove 
what 1 so far, that the moisture in the soil diffused by capillarity, as 
the result of such diffusion it is changed into vaporous moisture, 
and on Mr. Bishop’s own ipse dixit that the roots of plants being 
cooler than the vaporous moisture the latter is condensed on them. 
“ Vaporous moisture ” with Mr. Bishop seems to be a very elastic 
term, yet according to his own showing, no matter what amount of 
diffusion short of evaporation it may be subjected to, it is neither 
more nor less than water as H 2 O. If this is so, why then use the term 
condensation, which, under the circumstances, is both confusing and 
misleading ? 
Recent plant physiologists are content with the theory that the root 
hairs come into direct contact with moisture of the soil which for 
practical purposes may be called normal water as H 2 O, does Mr. Bishop 
deny this? As such we can understand it being the carrier of the 
soluble elements of plant food, but if he wants to confuse the issue it 
is easy enough for him to prove that some amount of evaporation is 
going on at all temperatures, but how long would the weeds quoted 
by Mr. Raillem have existed entirely on the infinitessimal proportion 
of water condensed on their roots ? Supposing Mr. Bishop can prove 
to us that the root-hairs are cooler than their surroundings, and his 
condensation theory, it will be interesting to know how he is going to 
supply the plant with its sulphur, potassium, iron, which are necessary, 
or have definite relation to special physiological purposes. If the dis¬ 
cussion is worth anything let us keep to the question at issue—viz., 
How the root supplies of plant food are obtained.”—T. G. W. 
I WILL now attend to and endeavour to answer Mr. Gilmour’s 
questions, which appear on page 218. 
Question 1, Do plants absorb their food in (a) actual liquid form 1 
In every instance I have stated the roots do absorb their food in solution 
with water. Professor Johnson, Sir Chas. A. Cameron, and other 
eminent men confirm this. Do the roots (h') imbibe vapour ? I am 
open to conviction on this, if I am not already half a convert. Baron 
Von Liebig, Johnson’s book on “ How Crops Grow,” and other authorities 
support this. I will give an extract or two:—” Water is found in 
plants, but it enters rather in the shape of vapour.” “ The plants 
which have most water in them grow in the driest place.” “ A wet 
soil i* totally unfit for plant growing.” “ A good soil is not one which 
will hold water, but one in which it will rapidly pass away.” “ The 
soil itself is composed of minute particles, through which air spaces 
abound. The water must be just enough to keep the particles moist, 
and the air in the spaces is thus kept in the condition of moist air. 
The roots traverse these air spaces, and it is moist air that roots want 
and not water.” 
Questions 2 and 3, I believe that roots can concentrate water, and 
also condense vapour into liquid ; therefore would have the power of 
condensing moisture in the process of evaporation. 
Question 4, The moisture existing in the soil mentioned by me is 
vapour partially condensed, and it is capable of dissolving any soluble 
matter. The roots can and do appropriate this. If Mr. Gilmour pass 
Scotch mist, clouds, or visible steam (the intermediate state) through a 
tube containing porous matter saturated with plant food, condensing 
this intermediate state into liquid (water), he will find, by using the 
proper tests, that the plant food will be present, 
Que-tion 5, Is ammonia plant food ? If ammonia does not pass off 
with the vapour how would it be on the glass? As to the condition 
it exists in it is not clearly known, but it is called diffused. All we 
know at present is that with a certain test we get ammonia. 
Question 6, Moisture existing low down in the soil. Some of this 
is brought to the surface by capillary attraction, while the other is 
diffused, some of it rising owing to its rarification, having passed into 
vapour. Twenty authorities might be quoted to bear out this fact. 
Question 7, What does Mr. Gilmour consider clouds, mist, fog, and 
the visible steam from a boiler or tea-kettle ? Water I presume. Why 
then does it not fall as rain ? Professor Tyndall calls it water dust. 
Some call it one thing and some another, but scientific authorities do 
not Cill it water. I have shown this to my scientific instructor, and 
he confirms what I say. He has obtained several medals for efficiency, 
also upwards of £400 in government grants this year, and has been a 
teacher for fifteen to twenty years in all grades of chemistry and other 
sciences. 
Question 8, Moisture as existing low down in the soil may be at 
different degrees of wetness, it may be a running current or at all 
degrees up to dryness. If there was merely a trace of moisture there 
vtpuld be no water nor liquid, but a degree of wetness. 
I must ask “R C. S,” (page 219) to look to the above for replies to 
his questions. Relative to the Cabbage and 6 inches of manure 2 feet 
deep without any food closer to the roots, I remember trenching in 
100 loads of manure on some sandy soil, 30 yards square. There was 
slow growth, and the next year we could scarcely trace the manure, the 
soil was so poor. This question wants treating in a different way.— 
G. A. Bishop. 
Mr. Bishop is getting on, I cannot say he is improving. In the last 
issue of the Journal (page 274) he puts forward a statement, the 
accuracy of which anyone may test. Here it is. On page 100, para¬ 
graph 4, he says, speaking of Mr. Raillem’s statement, “ In his last 
paragraph he (Mr. Raillem) states that it is not generally understood 
that roots of plants only imbibe moisture as it is in the process of being 
evaporated, and asks if it is true. If he leaves out the‘only,’ I (Mr. 
Bishop) say it is true, and defy contradiction.” Replying to my 
remarks on the foregoing paragraph, Mr. Bishop says (page 274, last 
paragraph but one), “ Here I stated that roots imbibe moisture in the 
process of evaporation by condensing it into liquid," Will my readers 
and the Editor please refer to the original statement (page 100, para¬ 
graph 4) and verify the fact that the words in italics are not there ? 
They can then, if they have not already done so, form their own opinion 
of Mr. Bishop and of his method of conducting an argument. 
May I here remind my readers that my original contention with 
Mr. Raillem was that plant roots absorb their food in actual liquid 
water. Mr. Raillem contended that this was not so, that the water was 
not actually liquid, but, as he put it, in process of evaporation. 
Mr. Bishop came forward to support Mr. Raillem, and stated that ” it is 
true that plants imbibe moisture in process of evaporation;” he also 
explained that this moisture was not liquid (page 100, paragraph 2). So 
readers can see from this that the whole basis of this weary argument is : 
” Do roots of plants absorb their food in actual liquid or not ? ” 1 say 
they do, and Mr. Bishop now says they do, for he says (page 274, last 
paragraph but one) roots absorb moisture in the process of evaporation, 
“ by condensing it into water.” Again he says (same paragraph) 
” moisture .... was condensed by the roots and imbibed.” Yet again 
(page 169, paragraph 6) he says : “ roots .... condense the moisture 
into water and assimilate it.” If Mr. Bishop were trying to demolish 
his own argument, could he do better than this ? 
Mr. Bishop says that the eight numbered statements I have put 
forward “do not honestly treat upon what was said.” It is very 
laborious to have to do it, but I will go over these eight statements and 
satisfy every reader of the Journal of Horticulture, except Mr. Bishop, 
that I have been most scrupulously fair to my opponent. I again 
challenge and defy Mr. Bishop to produce any authority which will 
go to prove that the following statements which he has made are 
correct. 
Statements 1 and 2, That roots of plants do not absorb their food in 
actual liquid water, and that they absorb their food in moisture not 
actually liquid, but in process of evaporation. 
Mr. Bishop (page 100, paragraph 2), speaking of the state of the 
mois ure which plant roots absorb says, “ Can this moisture be called 
water? Can it be called vapour, while one is a liquid and the other an 
invisible compound? I say no. It is a condition between the two,” 
&c. Page 100, paragraph 4, Mr. Bishop says, “ It is true that the roots 
of plants imbibe moisture as it is in process of being evaporated.” 
3, That roots of plants condense moisture and assimilate it. This 
statement is in Mr. Bishop’s own words (page 169, paragraph 6). 
4, That moisture in the soil, not in a liquid form, can and does 
contain all the elements of plant food. 
5, That vapour can and does hold in solution elements of plant food, 
gaseous or otherwise. 
Mr. Bishop says (page 169, paragraph 3), “ This vapour would still 
retain its compound nature .... and be capable of dissolving 
other gaseous compounds and elements, and holding them in that 
condition.” 
6, That moisture not being actual liquid water, can rise in the soil 
by capillary attraction. 
Mr. Bishop says (page 100, paragraph 2), “ Moisture low down in the 
soil .... becomes rarefied, and is diffused, carried by capillary 
attraction to the surface. 
7, That oxide of hydrogen exists in an intermediate state between 
vapour and water. 
Mr. Bishop says, “ There is a state in which oxide of hydrogen exists 
between water and vapour.” (Page 100, paragraph 6). 
8, That when the surface of the soil becomes dry by excessive heat, 
that the moisture which exists low down in the soil is not a liquid nor 
yet vapour. See his statement above quoted. 
I here ask, in reference to the foregoing statements, whether I have 
treated Mr. Bishop fairly and honourably, or not? 
Now a few words on a personal matter. Mr. Bishop states (page 274, 
last paragraph), “ That I have put forward eight questions especially 
constructed to answer my own purpose, ignoring the fact that they do 
not honestly treat upon what was said.” These words are an insult to 
me. They practically charge me with dishonourable dealing towards 
Mr. Bishop. I call on the Editor to ask Mr. Bishop either to prove 
his words, quoted above, to be true, or to withdraw them.—• 
D. Gilmour 
[We think, with “ T. G. W.,” that this correspondence is becoming 
somewhat involved, and the more briefly and courteously the discussion 
is conducted the more it will be appreciated. Mr. Gilmour, as an 
honourable man, if a trenchant critic, has a right to what he asks 
of Mr. Bishop, and Mr. Bishop has an equal right to defend any of 
bis propositions which he thinks have been assailed by Mr. Gilmour. 
We shall not be able to find space for lengthened communications.] 
