KNOWLEDGE OF MONOCOTYLEDONOUS SAPROPHYTES. 173 
the anti-placental bundles, very small bundles run longitudinally 
in the placentz. These small bundles contain no lignified con- 
stituents and appear to be solely made up of narrow elongated 
parenchyma (and sieve-tubes ?). 
The placenta are large and branched. Their proximal parts 
consist mainly of parenchyma and the small bundles. But the 
larger part of the placent: is constituted of enormous mucilage- 
cells (fig. 9), which are ranged in masses rather than in longitu- 
dinal rows. Each mucilage-cell contains a large sponge-work 
of mucilage, a central vacuole in which lies a small dense mass 
of mucilage*. Noraphides occur. A small nucleus lies pressed 
against the wall of the cell. Between the mucilage-cells are 
mostly thin-walled flattened cells containing no starch but 
having granular protoplasm and a large nucleus. In the same 
part of the placenta, here and there, are strings of smaller 
cells elongated in a transverse plane and containing starch. 
They communicate by irregular lines of starch-containing cells 
with the cells of the proximal portion of the placenta, which 
also contain starch. In fact they might be termed conducting 
parenchyma-cells. 
At the base of the ovary, where few or no ovules are attached, 
the small placenta, in transverse section, consists of few (about 
two) mucilage-cells enveloped by a mass of small parenchyma 
choked with starch-grains. 
The anatropous seeds appear to be mature or nearly so. 
Several layers of cuticularized cells form a testa. A simple un- 
differentiated embryo without a suspensor fills nearly the whole 
of the cavity of the seed. A few cells with thin cellulose-walls, 
scarce any protoplasm, but having sharply-defined nuclei, occupy 
a small region remote from the micropyle. They appear to 
represent the remains of the endosperm. 
One fruit was considerably decayed in several spots, and par- 
ticularly near the base, and was half eaten away. The ovules 
were intact. The exposed cells of the ovary-wall had brown mem- 
branes and protoplasmic contents, and on the walls of many of 
* Again I must call attention to the fact that the material was fixed with 
methylated spirits. In some of the mucilage-cells in different parts of the 
plant the mucilage appeared to be in the form of isolated bubbles lying ina 
protoplasmic network. But in the majority of cells the network stained red, 
like the central mass of mucilage. This may be a stage subsequent to the 
bubble-like condition. 
