Dr. Bose here described how after deep thought and careful experiments and researches of several years he invented and manufactured a highly sensitive instrument which could automatically record the "response time" of a plant even to one thousandth part of a second. And in order to convey a graphic idea of the principles under which it worked, he had even made by means of a few simple things a crude form of his instrument, which helped the audience to form a clear idea of how a shock given to a plant which was experimented upon, would be recorded automatically by the apparatus by means of dots on its writing pad, and also how to ascertain the exact time each plant took to respond to the stimulus received. Thus the plant now records its own history unerringly by its own hand as it were. And that the _same_ results are obtained each time the experiment is repeated under similar conditions, shows that this recording of the response time is a scientific phenomenon. As an example of the similarities of reactions in plant and animal, Prof. Bose described the rhythmic activities of certain plants, in which automatic pulsations are maintained as in the animal heart. This phenomenon is exemplified by the Telegraph plant, which grows wild in the Gangetic plane; its Indian name is _Bon charal_ or 'forest churl', the popular belief being that it dances to the clapping of the hand. There is no foundation however for this belief. It is a papilionaceous plant with trifoliate leaves, of which the terminal leaflet is large, and the two lateral, very small. Each of these is inserted on the petiole by means of pulvinule. The lateral leaflets are seen to execute pulsating movements which are apparently uncaused, and are not unlike the rhythmic movement of the heart to which we shall see later that their resemblance is more than superficial.