rom without pass within, and how this
nervous impulse modified during transit. It will further be shown how
various stimulants, anesthetics and poison induce effects which are
identical in man and in plant. It will be obvious how these studies
will open new fields of inquiry in different branches of science; in
Physiology and Psychology; in Medicine and in Agriculture.

--_Amrita Bazar Patrika_, 7-1-1918.

VISUALISATION OF GROWTH

Sir J. C. Bose delivered on the 18th January 1918, at the Bose
Institute, the second of the series of discourses on revelations of
plant life. This time the audience had the opportunity of witnessing the
working of Bose's newly perfected Crescograph which is undoubtedly one
of the marvels in modern Science. For this apparatus gives a visual
demonstration of movements which are far beyond the highest powers of
microscope. The invisible internal workings of life are thus for the
first time revealed to man.

LAW VERSUS CAPRICE

The lecturer first described the infinite variations in life reactions
in plants. The same external stimulus, he said apparently produces one
effect in one plant; and precisely opposite in another. Some leaves move
towards light; others are repelled by it. The root bends towards the
centre of the earth, the shoot rises above away from it. Numerous other
"tropic" movements are caused by contact, by electricity, by moisture
and by invisible radiations. These effects appear so extremely diverse
and capricious that some of the leading physiologists were forced to
come to the conclusion that there was no law guiding such movement, but
that the plant decides for itself what should be the effect of external
conditions on it.

RECORD OF GROWTH

Most of these tropic movements are brought about by changes induced in
growth by the action of different forces. But growth is so excessively
slow that slight changes induced in it is impossible of detection. The
proverbially slow paced snail moves two thousand times faster than the
growing point of a plant. Hence to visualise growth and its changes,
apparatus has to be invented which would magnify growth something like a
million times. If such a thing were possible the pace of the snail
would be quickened to the speed of a rifle bullet. The difficulties in
connection with the devising and construction of apparatus with this
extraordinary power appeared at first an impossibility. The Jewels for
the fittings of the appar