RECENT ADVANCES IN SCIENCE 135 



the relation with the fungus been shown to be obligate as in 

 Calluna. Baden has shown that the spores of an agaric {Coprinus 

 sp.) are incapable of germinating unless accompanied by 

 bacteria — the first recorded case, outside of the Myxomycetes 

 (Mycetozoa), of this remarkable and as yet unexplained pheno- 

 menon. 



Selecting only such anatomical investigations as appear of 

 special interest in bearing upon the phylogeny (relationships) of 

 plants and plant-groups, the following may be noted. Kashyap 

 {New Phyt. 14), in the third of his series of papers on new and 

 little-known West Himalayan liverworts, describes among other 

 new forms a new genus Seivardiella which is related to Fossom- 

 bronia, but not differentiated into stem and leaves, and suggests 

 the somewhat heterodox view that leafy forms may have given 

 rise by reduction to non-leafy (thalloid) ones among the liver- 

 worts. Bryan {Bot. Gaz. 59) describes in great detail the develop- 

 ment of the female organ (archegonium) of the bog-moss 

 {Sphagnum) and finds that the apical-cell growth hitherto 

 regarded as distinguishing this organ in mosses does not occur 

 in Sphagnum ; his results confirm Cavers' conclusion from study 

 of other forms that the usually accepted division of the sub- 

 kingdom Bryophyta into two primary classes (liverworts and 

 mosses) cannot longer be maintained. Hodgetts {New Phyt. 14) 

 describes the occurrence, as outgrowths from the stem, of 

 flattened juvenile stages (protonema) in the moss Tetraphis, these 

 being exactly similar to the protonema arising from the germin- 

 ating spore in this moss and affording additional support for the 

 new classification of the Bryophyta proposed by Cavers. Lang 

 has added to his previous elaborate studies of the morphology 

 and anatomy of the fern family Ophioglossaceae a detailed paper 

 on Helminthostachys {Amu of Bot. 29) ; his earlier conclusion, 

 that this family is related to the ancient fern stock including the 

 relatively primitive fossil and recent fern groups, is strengthened 

 by the results here presented. Burlinghame {Bot. Gaz. 59) has 

 added to his earlier studies of the interesting monkey-puzzle 

 genus (Arancaria) a paper dealing with fertilisation, embryo and 

 seed ; his main conclusions are that the seed structure and polli- 

 nation apparatus of the Araucarians could readily be derived 

 from the type of seeds or ovules represented by fossil Lycopods 

 such as Miadesmia, but not from an Abietinean (pine) stock, and 

 that modern Conifers may have arisen from a Mesozoic stock 



