The Movements and Habits of Climbing Plants by Charles Darwin
page 6 of 178 (03%)
page 6 of 178 (03%)
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for the internode suddenly became upright, and after moving to the
centre, remained motionless. I tied a weight to its upper end, so as to bow it slightly and thus detect any movement; but there was none. Some time before the last revolution was half performed, the lower part of the internode ceased to move. A few more remarks will complete all that need be said about this internode. It moved during five days; but the more rapid movements, after the performance of the third revolution, lasted during three days and twenty hours. The regular revolutions, from the ninth to thirty-sixth inclusive, were effected at the average rate of 2 hrs. 31 m.; but the weather was cold, and this affected the temperature of the room, especially during the night, and consequently retarded the rate of movement a little. There was only one irregular movement, which consisted in the stem rapidly making, after an unusually slow revolution, only the segment of a circle. After the seventeenth revolution the internode had grown from 1.75 to 6 inches in length, and carried an internode 1.875 inch long, which was just perceptibly moving; and this carried a very minute ultimate internode. After the twenty-first revolution, the penultimate internode was 2.5 inches long, and probably revolved in a period of about three hours. At the twenty-seventh revolution the lower and still moving internode was 8.375, the penultimate 3.5, and the ultimate 2.5 inches in length; and the inclination of the whole shoot was such, that a circle 19 inches in diameter was swept by it. When the movement ceased, the lower internode was 9 inches, and the penultimate 6 inches in length; so that, from the twenty-seventh to thirty-seventh revolutions inclusive, three internodes were at the same time revolving. The lower internode, when it ceased revolving, became upright and |
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