BULLETIN OF THE BUSSEY INSTITUTION. 79 
VI. The skins were removed from some kernels of pop-corn 
which were then soaked in ether during three or, in some 
instances, four days, and subsequently dried at 100° C. No 
success was met with on trying to pop them. They behaved like 
the skinned kernels that had not been treated with ether. 
It is plain, from the foregoing trials, that the skin of the grain 
exerts a very decided influence on the act of popping. It would 
appear, indeed, that both the structure of the individual starch 
grains in the kernel and the toughness of the restraining skin 
which envelops them all, act to control or modify the manner in . 
which the moisture in the starch grains when suddenly heated is 
converted into steam of such high tension that the explosive act 
of popping results, whereby both the skin of the seed itself and 
the envelopes of most of the starch grains in the seed are 
ruptured. 
