Linnaan Society. 193 



the accordance of those observations with some universal law of re- 

 production. The points to which his attention was more particularly- 

 directed were, first, whether the Aphis is really viviparous at one 

 season and oviparous at another ; and secondly, whether the sup- 

 posed ova are true eggs, or, as some have imagined, merely capsules 

 designed for the protection of the already-formed embryos during the 

 winter season. 



On the 30th of November Mr. Newport observed the deposition 

 of the egg by the female Aphis, and found it to be a true egg, similar 

 to that of other insects, composed of an orange-coloured yolk, formed 

 of yellow nucleated cells, surrounded by a very small quantity of 

 transparent vitelline fluid, and containing a very large germinal 

 vesicle with a distinct macula or nucleus. On the 2nd of December 

 the females were again seen to produce living young, and Mr. New- 

 port describes the process of parturition which he then observed. 

 These observations confirm the statements of former naturalists on 

 both the points inquired into, and negative the presumption raised 

 with reference to the capsular character of the egg by proving it to 

 possess all the characters of a true ovum. 



April 21.— Edward Forster, Esq., V.P., in the Chair. 



Mr. Ward, F.L.S., exhibited specimens of the dried plant and fruit 

 of Uncaria procumbens, Burchell, from South Africa ; and also a por- 

 tion of the stipes of a fern from New Plymouth, New Zealand, pro- 

 bably belonging to Pteris esculenta, Sol., measuring several feet in 

 length. Mr. Carrington, from whom the latter specimen was ob- 

 tained, stated that the species of fern from which it was obtained 

 grows, in the neighbourhood of the coast, to the height of five feet, 

 in masses of from six to seven feet diameter, so strong and dense 

 as to be capable, if a cover were thrown over it, of sustaining the 

 weight of a man. On the margin of the bushland it attains a height 

 of twenty-one feet, and Mr. Carrington has observed it on the banks 

 of a river, when interlaced and matted together, to measure thirty 

 feet. 



Read a paper " On the Development of Starch and Chlorophylle." 

 By Edwin John Quekett, Esq., F.L.S. &c. 



Mr. Quekett commences by referring to the observations and opi- 

 nions of Miiller, Miinter and Nageli on the subject of the formation 

 of starch and chlorophylle in the cells of plants, and to his own ob- 

 servations, recorded in the 'Pharmaceutical Journal,' vol. iii. 1843-44, 

 on the growth of starch in the leaves of Vallisneria spiralis. Miiller, 

 he states, has observed that in the cells of Chara crinita, the cyto- 

 blast becomes hollow, enlarges, and fills the cell-membrane in which 

 it is contained, and ultimately becomes the reservoir for granules of 

 starch ; while Nageli has observed that in Caulerpa prolifera, at the 

 period of the formation of starch, the cells contain several smaller 

 cells, in each of which are developed generally from three to four 

 grains of starch. In order to observe the growth of starch and chlo- 

 rophylle, Mr. Quekett examined in several plants the organs in which 



Ann. §• Mag. N. Hist. Vol. xviii. P 



