Page:History of botany (Sachs; Garnsey).djvu/580

560 tion of growth at the internodes may vary very greatly, and even Hunter's measurements in growing internodes in 1841 and 1843, and Grisebach's in 1843 led to no appreciable result, because the observers neglected to apply the figures obtained to the theory of the subject. It seemed to be generally supposed that it was enough simply to write down the measurements in figures, and that a theoretical result would spring into being of itself; on the contrary the real scientific work begins after the figures are obtained. The same cause prevented the observations which have yet to be mentioned from producing real fruit. The influence of the variability of the temperature of the air, and of the alternation of daylight and darkness on the longitudinal growth of internodes and leaves after they have emerged from the bud-condition, had often been investigated; Christian Jacob Trew published in 1727 long-continued daily measurements on the flowering stem of Agave Americana in conjunction with observations on temperature and weather; a hundred years later similar observations were made by Ernst Meyer in 1827, by Mulder in 1829, and by Van der Hopp and De Vriese in 1847 and 1848; but Harting in 1842 and Caspary in 1856 were the first who went at all deeply into the questions involved. These observations, some of which were carefully made, led to no further result than the discovery of the fact, which Miinter indicated and Harting applied to theoretical purposes but which no one else thought worthy of attention, namely that the rate of growth increases at first and independently of external causes, till it reaches a maximum, and then decreases till at length it comes to an end; they did not even establish a really practical method of observation. Scarcely two observers arrived at the same result, because the questions respecting the relations of growth in length to temperature and light had not been clearly and distinctly put. Communications were published in the periodicals, which simply