By PROF. J. H. MONTGOMERY.
The numberless uses for india-rubber in this century has made it an
indispensable article of commerce and manufacture, consequently its
production has become a great industry. Whether the known forests will
continue to supply the demand for any considerable time is a practical
question. Right here comes the intelligence, that the attention of the
government in India has been called to a new source of this useful gum.
This new plant which yields large quantities of pure caoutchouc is a
native of Cochin China, and is common in Southern India. It belongs to
the _dog-bane_ family (the same family that yields strychnine), and is
called _Prameria Glandalifera_. In lower China its liquid juice is used
for medicine by the Anamites and Cambodians, and it also appears among
the drugs of China.
* * * * *
The Norwegian, Schübeler, mentions some striking peculiarities of
plants in high latitudes. He says that seeds produced in these regions
are much larger and weigh more than those grown in more temperate
climates. The leaves, also, of most plants are larger in the north
than those of the same species farther south. Flowers which are white
in warmer climates, become colored when they blossom in the north. All
these differences he ascribes to the continued light of long days.
* * * * *
It is noted by naturalists that Arctic plants are destitute of odor as
a rule; only a few having a faint scent.
* * * * *
It appears from an English paper that the secretary of the Royal
Society transplanted sea-weed to earth that was kept constantly moist,
and that the plants grew and flourished under what would seem to be
very unnatural circumstances. This would be an experiment worth trying
with our fresh water plants.
* * * * *
By placing the stems of freshly cut flowers in a liquid dye their
petals may often be colored or changed in color. This will not always
happen, however, as certain colors are not absorbed by flowers. These
dyes do not in any way change or affect the perfume or freshness.
* * * * *
The time honored method of determining the age of trees by counting
their concentric rings has received some very hard blows from recent
observations made on the growth of trees. An article in the _Popular
Science Monthly_, from the pen of A. L. Childs, M.D., gives some facts
which show that these rings do not indicate the age of the tree, and
shows what they do indicate. The following passages from the article
will give the ground on which his deductions are based: “In June of
1871 I planted a quantity of seed as it ripened and fell from some
red maple trees. In 1873 I transplanted some of the trees from these
seeds, placing them on my city lots in Plattsmouth, Nebraska. In
August, 1882, finding them too much crowded, I cut some out, and, the
concentric rings being very distinct, I counted them. From the day of
planting the seed to the day of cutting the trees was two months over
eleven years. On one, more distinctly marked (although there was but
little difference between them), I counted on one side of the heart
forty rings. Other sides were not so distinct; but in no part were
there fewer than thirty-five. * * * * Hence, from my own record, I
_knew_ the tree had but twelve years of growth; and yet, as counted
by myself and many others, it had forty clear concentric rings. * *
* Hon. R. W. Furness, late Governor of Nebraska, so well known as a
practical forester, has kindly furnished me with several sections of
trees of known age, from which I select the following: A pig-hickory
eleven years old, with sixteen distinct rings; a green ash eight years
old, with eleven very plain rings; a Kentucky coffee-tree ten years
old, with fourteen very distinct rings, and, in addition to these,
twenty-one sub-rings; a burr-oak ten years old, with twenty-four
equally distinct rings; a black walnut five years old, with twelve
rings. * * * In conclusion, that the more distinct concentric rings of
a tree approximate, or in some cases exactly agree, in number with the
years of the tree, no one, I presume, will deny; but that in most, and
probably nearly all trees, intermediate rings or sub-rings, generally
less conspicuous, yet often more distinct than the annual rings, exist
is equally certain; and I think the foregoing evidence is sufficient
to induce those who prefer truth to error to examine the facts of the
case. These sub-rings or additional rings are easily accounted for by
sudden and more or less frequent changes of weather, and requisite
conditions of growth—each check tending to solidify the newly-deposited
cambium, or forming layer; and, as long intervals occur of extreme
drought or cold, or other unfavorable causes, the condensation produces
a more pronounced and distinct ring than the annual one.”