44 BOTANY 
sugar will be found to be present, especially in the 
radicle and plumule. This is what one would naturally 
expect. The insoluble starch has been converted into 
soluble sugar so that the plant can use It. Where 
changes such as this take place in an organic substance 
owing to the action of a living thing or something 
produced by a living thing, the process is known as 
fermentation. The conversion of the starch into sugar 
is due to a ferment called diastase. This ferment is 
particularly active in germinating barley, and rapidly 
changes most of the starch of the grain into sugar. 
It is on this cireumstance that the malting of barley 
depends. 
Now take a date stone that has been kept for a 
couple of weeks in damp sawdust. The endosperm will 
be found to have softened considerably, and, on being 
tested with Fehling’s Solution, it will be seen that the 
cellulose has been largely converted into sugar. This 
is due to another ferment called cytase. 
Oil itself is insoluble in water, and therefore the 
embryo in the castor oil seed cannot make use of this 
reserve material of the endosperm unless some form 
of fermentation takes place. As a matter of fact, the 
oil, by the agency of a ferment called lipase, is, at 
germination, split up into fatty acid and glycerine, 
both of which are soluble in water. This is well shown 
by the following experiment. Test linseed oil with 
blue and red litmus paper. As there is no result in 
either case, the oil is neither acid nor alkaline. In 
other words, it is neutral. Now erush germinating 
castor beans and add them to the oil. After a few 
hours the oil will turn blue litmus red, showing that 
the lipase has separated fatty acid from the elycerine. 
Carbon dioxide We have already seen in the 
experiment with caustic soda that during germination 
carbon dioxide is formed. This fact may be more 
simply demonstrated. On a wet cloth in the bottom 
