116 M. Miiller on the Development of the Lycopodiacese. 



gium of about the same size as the antheridia^ the periphery pre- 

 senting four rounded projections. These projecting portions are 

 always opposed in pairs^ so that their Hues of intersection cross 

 (PL IV, figs. 3—5). Schleiden (Grundz. ed. 1. ii. 82) calls it 

 a rounded tetrahedral fruit ; but the expression ^'four-knobbed 

 (vierhiigelige) fruit '' appears to me much more indicative of its 

 character, as a rounded tetrahedral form does not include the 

 rounded projections which so distinctly occur. At its base the 

 oophoridium is furnished with a short pedicel, compressed on 

 two sides, which consequently resembles the axis of the branch 

 (fig. 3). Around this pedicel is a circular spot consisting of de- 

 licate, minute and hyaline cellular tissue (fig. 4). From this 

 runs out on each side a long, elliptical space which also consists 

 of the same delicate tissue (fig. 4). The latter spaces indicate 

 the line in which the oophoridium subsequently opens, without 

 being itself actually torn. In L. gracillimum these two long spaces 

 are dichotomously divided. The line of dehiscence also extends 

 over the crown of the sporangium (fig. 5). The crown however 

 is usually regularly depressed inward in the younger stages. The 

 membrane of the oophoridium is composed of a layer of dense 

 parenchymatous cellular tissue. On the inner wall of this is 

 usually found an irregularly deposited, green cellular mass, 

 which is apparently a secondary deposit : this is what we find 

 in L. denticulatum. The four germinative spores found in the 

 sporangium have already been spoken of in § 2 ; they form the 

 four projections of the oophoridium. 



When the fruit-bearing axis is examined in a very early con- 

 dition — and this is necessary, since the organs of fructification 

 are very rapidly developed — a relation between the oophoridium 

 and antheridium shows itself, which cannot easily be detected in 

 the subsequent fully- developed condition. The spikelets bearing 

 the oophoridium and the antheridia here appear as perfectly 

 distinct parts (fig. 6) : they deviate from each other dichoto- 

 mously, just as the young forking branches of the axis do. The 

 oophoridium is at this time externally an almost angular, round- 

 ish, inflated body, the breadth not exceeding the length (fig. 6 a) ; 

 but very soon, after it has produced the four spores in its inte- 

 rior, it acquires the already-noticed four-lobed form with much 

 more distinctness. The oophoridium is then, generally, of a 

 longish shape and compressed on two sides (fig. 10). In this 

 ellipsoidal form it stands with the longer face on the base of the 

 spike, so that the angle of the spike, produced by the above- 

 described keel of the leaf, corresponds approximatively to the 

 middle of the oophoridium (13 a). If this organ is now looked 

 at laterally, so that the two prominences a b in fig. 10 lie on a 

 level with the eye of the observer who thus looks along the long 



