610  Botany  and  Materia  Medica. 
The  author  adopts  the  term  "  Caliology  "  for  the  physiological 
study  of  the  cell,  including  both  its  reproductive  and  vegetative 
aspects.  The  activities  of  the  plant  may  be  considered  from  two 
standpoints :  that  of  the  plant's  individual  economy  and  of  the 
plant's  social  economy,  or  its  relation  to  other  plants  and  animals 
and  the  world  at  large.  The  inappropriateness  of  the  terms  biology 
and  phytobiology,  to  the  study  of  the  latter  division,  is  referred  to. 
Ecology  is  the  term  which  has  been  proposed  almost  simultaneously 
in  America  and  in  England,  for  the  study  of  the  external  or  socio- 
logical economy  of  the  adult  plant.  The  approved  tendency  is  to 
restrict  the  usage  of  the  term  "  vegetable  physiology  "  to  the  con- 
sideration of  the  internal  or  individual  economy  dealing  with  the 
most  vital  problem  of  how  the  individual  lives. 
In  the  Botanical  Gazette,  October,  p.  458, 
Nature  and  Life   D  X  MacDougal  reviews  the  work  of  Arthur 
Starch  drains  Meyer,2  which  modifies  materially  the  accepted 
views  on  these  subjects.  According  to  this 
investigator,  starch  grains  are  true  sphere  crystals,  in  every  way 
analogous  to  the  sphere  crystals  of  inulin,  and  are  composed  of  two 
forms  of  amylose  and  a  trace  of  amylodextrin.  In  an  anomalous 
form,  which  colors  reddish-brown  with  iodine,  the  proportion  of 
amylodextrin  is  very  large.  This  red  starch  is  characteristic  of  a 
large  number  of  saprophytes,  but  has  been  found  in  less  than  a 
score  of  the  higher  green  plants.  Meyer  finds  that  the  action  of 
diastase  on  starch  is  a  purely  katalytic  process,  and  in  every  way 
analogous  to  the  katalytic  action  of  acids,  except  that  it  is  more 
easily  influenced  by  external  conditions,  such  as  heat,  etc. 
The  validity  of  the  observations  upon  which  is  based  Nageli's 
hypothesis  as  to  the  growth  and  structure  of  starch  grains,  is 
denied  in  toto.  The  grains  have  their  origin  and  growth  entirely 
within  chromatophores,  where  they  are  held  as  long  as  the  cell  is 
living.  Growth  consists  of  the  superposition  of  new  layers  of 
materials  on  those  previously  formed.  The  layers  are  due  to  the 
periodic  activity  of  the  chromatophore.  The  contour  is  due  entirely 
to  the  pressure  exerted  on  the  chromatophore  by  the  cytoplasm,  and 
the  size  depends  upon  the  biologic  relations  of  the  plant.    Thus,  in 
2 Arthur  Meyer,  Untersuchungen  iiberdie  Starkekorner  der  hoheren  Pflanzen. 
Gustave  Fischer,  Jena,  1895. 
