558 SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



this treats of Lithothamnionete, Melobesieaa, and Mastophorete. Madame 

 Weber writes the second part, "The Corallines) verae of the Malay 

 Archipelago," in which she presents a new and most important character 

 for the determination of the genera of this group. She finds that the 

 arrangement of cells at the nodes differs in different genera, and is always 

 constant, so that systematists will no longer be obliged to depend almost 

 solely on the conceptacnla for the distinguishing characters of puzzling 

 genera. She describes two new genera, Metagoniolithon and Lithar- 

 thron, founded on previously known species of Amphiroa ; and one new 

 species Amphiroa anastomosans. An introduction to the monograph is 

 also written by Madame Weber, who gives an account of the banks of 

 coral alga3, mostly Lithothamnion erubescens, which she saw while on the 

 Siboga. The subject of the coral algae banks was studied on the spot 

 by herself and Prof. Weber, and their results form the subject of this 

 interesting introduction. Photographs are given of one of the Litho- 

 thamnion banks, showing that the surface of the reef is covered w r ith 

 rounded balls of the alga. The illustrations to the paper are numerous, 

 and consist largely of reproductions of photographs, taken natural size, 

 of the various species described. 



Development of the Spermatozoid in Chara.* — D. M. Mottier 

 alludes to the work on this subject by Belajeff, and then proceeds to de- 

 scribe the details of the development, in which some of his results differ 

 slightly from those of Belajeff. The spermatozoid of Chara is a spirally 

 coiled body consisting of a nucleus, and a specially differentiated part of 

 the cytoplasm which exists in the form of a thread or band, the blepha- 

 roplast, and bears two long cilia. The nucleus occupies the middle part 

 of the spermatozoid, while the blepharoplast extends its entire length. 

 The development of the blepharoplast is described in detail, and the 

 author believes it to be a modification of the plasma-membrane — a 

 direct transformation of it. The cilia were always found attached some 

 distance behind the anterior extremity of the blepharoplast. 



Algal Vegetation of the Faerbes.f — F. Borgesen publishes an in- 

 teresting account of the algal flora of these islands from a geographical 

 point of view. He divides his book into the following sections : Intro- 

 duction. I. On the external conditions of algal vegetation on the 

 coasts of the Faeroes. II. General character of the algal vegetation. 



III. Regions and association of alg03 on the coasts of the Faeroes. 



IV. Position in plant geography of the algal flora of the Faeroes. 



V. Biological observations. Under the first heading, the author deals 

 with the climatological and hydrographical relations, temperatures and 

 salinity, tides and currents, force of the waves on the outer and inner 

 coast lines, temperature and humidity of the air, and light. The third 

 section is divided into (1) the littoral region, (2) the sublittoral region, 

 (3) the lowest limit of algal vegetation, the elittoral region. The 

 author comes to the conclusion that the algal flora of the Faeroes is most 

 closely related to that of the northern shores of the British Isles, and 



* Ann. of Bot., xviii. (1904) pp. 245-53 (1 pi.). 



t Om Algevegetationen ved Faeroernes Kyster. Copenhagen, 1904, 125 pp. 

 (12 pi., 9 text figs., 1 map). 



