BULLETIN OF THE BUSSEY INSTITUTION. 437 
No. 39. — On the results of a Search for other Sugars than 
Xylose and Dextrose in the products of the Hydrolysis of 
Wood from the Trunks of Trees. By F. H. Srorer, 
Professor of Agricultural Chemistry. 
Several years ago I had oceasion * to call attention to the fact 
that not infrequently undue prominence has been given to the 
opinion somewhat widely held by botanists, and by chemists also, 
that an abundance of starch is stored in winter as a ‘‘ reserve 
matter” in the wood of many kinds of trees. In reality, there is 
much less starch in the trunk-wood of trees growing in temperate 
or northern climates than has ordinarily been supposed. Hence 
the need of studying anew the general question, What are the 
reserve matters in trees? As well as the specific question, 
Whence comes the sugar which is found in the spring in the 
sap of many kinds of trees? 
It is to be remarked that the false impression as to the presence 
of much starch in woods depended primarily on the use of im- 
proper methods of analysis for estimating the starch; t though 
it is not improbable that too much importance may sometimes 
have been accorded to the microscopical observations of botanists 
on the presence of starch in the twigs of trees. In so far as the 
life of the whole tree is concerned, it may perhaps be true that 
the reserve starch stored in twigs should be regarded in some sort 
as a matter of merely local significance. 
It is true of course that the wood of the trunks of trees often 
or even usually contains in store some starch and that in the 
bark also there can be found small quantities of sugars and of 
substances, such as glucosids, which may be capable of reducing 
cupric oxide after they have been subjected to the action of water, 
diastase and a dilute acid, as happens in the process of analysis 
which depends on the application of malt. But inasmuch as the 
visible effect produced by matters held in store in trees is often 
out of all proportion greater than can be credited to the small 
quantities of starch and glucosids exhibited by analysis, it seems 
probable that there must be other carbohydrates stored habitually 
“ Bulletin of the Bussey Institution. 1897, 2. 386. 
+ Loe. cit., page 391. 
