My gaze was fixed eagerly on the screen which reflected the magnified
fern-shadow. Minute life-movements were now clearly perceptible;
the plant was growing very slowly before my fascinated eyes. The
scientist touched the tip of the fern with a small metal bar. The
developing pantomime came to an abrupt halt, resuming the eloquent
rhythms as soon as the rod was withdrawn.

"You saw how any slight outside interference is detrimental to the
sensitive tissues," Bose remarked. "Watch; I will now administer
chloroform, and then give an antidote."

The effect of the chloroform discontinued all growth; the antidote
was revivifying. The evolutionary gestures on the screen held me
more raptly than a "movie" plot. My companion (here in the role
of villain) thrust a sharp instrument through a part of the fern;
pain was indicated by spasmodic flutters. When he passed a razor
partially through the stem, the shadow was violently agitated, then
stilled itself with the final punctuation of death.

"By first chloroforming a huge tree, I achieved a successful
transplantation. Usually, such monarchs of the forest die very
quickly after being moved." Jagadis smiled happily as he recounted
the life-saving maneuver. "Graphs of my delicate apparatus have
proved that trees possess a circulatory system; their sap movements
correspond to the blood pressure of animal bodies. The ascent of
sap is not explicable on the mechanical grounds ordinarily advanced,
such as capillary attraction. The phenomenon has been solved through
the crescograph as the activity of living cells. Peristaltic waves
issue from a cylindrical tube which extends down a tree and serves
as an actual heart! The more deeply we perceive, the more striking