Unpublished paper, 'Some further observations and experiments illustrative of the cause of the ascent, and continued motion of the sap, in continuation of a paper presented to the Royal Society in November 1842' by George Rainey

Description

Rainey shares details of some experiments which he has made and which he believes to corroborate the opinions he advanced in his earlier papers on the motion of sap (see AP/26/12 and AP/26/13): namely, that the ascending sap is situated in the intercellular and intervascular spaces of the plant, and that its passage into the cells is effected by the action of endosmose, which the intervening membranes, whether living, or deprived of vitality, exert upon that fluid. Rainey observes that portions of many plants, such as Anthriscus vulgaris and the Lapsana communis, absorb a much larger quantity of fluid when they are immersed in pure water than when similarly immersed in a solution of gum-arabic; and that, in the latter case, the remaining portion of the solution is of the same specific gravity as before any part has been absorbed by the plant.

Annotations in ink throughout.

Subject: Botany / Phytomorphology

Received 11 January 1844. Read 15 February 1844. Communicated by P M [Peter Mark] Roget.

Whilst the Royal Society declined to publish this paper in full, an abstract of the paper was published in volume 5 of Abstracts of the Papers Printed in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London [later Proceedings of the Royal Society] as 'Some further observations and experiments illustrative of the cause of the ascent and continued motion of the sap, in continuation of a paper presented to the Royal Society in November 1842'.

Reference number

AP/27/7

Earliest possible date

1844

Physical description

Ink on paper

Page extent

4 pages

Format

Manuscript