106 MR. HENFREY ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE SPORES 
between the latter and the columella; while in the Hepatice where the inner membrane 
is wanting, they run in free among the parent-cells of the spores.” __ 
Von Mohl* gives no account of the development of elaters; with regard to certain of 
his views on the development of the spores, I shall allude to the papers just cited, 
further on. 
Gottschet does not describe the development of the elaters, nor indeed the earlier 
conditions of the spores. 
I now proceed to the results of my own researches on this subject. 
The little green cellular body which is found within the pistillidium increases in size, 
and in the course of its growth its cells are differently modified; the external layers, over 
the whole surface, adhere together into a membrane, which becomes the spiral-celled 
membrane of the capsule; the cells contained within this layer produce the spores and 
elaters. I have not been able to determine satisfactorily the earliest conditions of the 
enclosed cells. In the youngest specimens I found it impossible to ascertain the true 
nature of the structure, on account of its delicacy, but I believe that Bischoff is certainly 
wrong in supposing the young capsule to be filled with a mucilaginous fluid (brei). 
Mr. Griffith and M. Mirbel state, that there exists a continuous tissue in Targionia ; and 
Mr. Fitt} states that the apparently gelatinous contents of the capsule of Spherocarpus 
terrestris exhibited a cellular appearance, when dried up, on the object-glass. From these 
facts and from analogy, I am inclined to believe that the young capsule is at first 
formed of a continuous cellular structure, and that the cells of this tissue become parent- 
cells, producing new cells within them, which they set free by becoming dissolved; 
exactly as occurs in the production of the parent-cells of the pollen-grains, in the con- 
tinuous cellular tissue of anthers. 
However this may be, it is certain that cells do become free in the cavity, producing the 
elaters and spores, and the condition and form in which they present themselves is very 
remarkable. M. Mirbel states that he found minute elongated cells, the young elaters, 
mingled with small squarish cells, the spores, which afterwards acquired a globular form. 
It is evident from this that he missed the earlier stages of the metamorphoses. I found 
the young capsules to contain elongated cells alone, and these of two sizes. The whole 
cavity of the capsule was filled up by elongated cells arranged side by side, and apparently 
radiating from the centre; a portien of these elongated cells were narrow, and were 
interposed between much longer and broader ones of the same form, in such a manner 
that scarcely any interspaces existed. The narrow cells are the young elaters, while the 
broader ones are the parent-cells of the spores. The subsequent development I have 
followed out clearly. The young elaters are elongated, slender tubes, attenuated toward 
each extremity; they are at first filled merely with an almost colourless, coagulable pro- 
toplasm. After a short time starch-granules make their appearance in them, the true 
Ueber die Entwickelung und den Bau der Sporen der Crypt-Gewächse, Flora 1833; Vermischte Schrift. 67. 
Ueber die Entwick. der Sporen von Anthoceros levis, Linnæa 1839; Verm. Schrift. 84. 
t Ueber Haplomitrium Hookeri, à ME : 
Ni Asin a um Hookeri, Nova Acta, vol. xx. Ueber die Fructification der Jungermanniæ Geocalyceæ, 
t London Journal of Botany, vol. vi. 
