80 TUK .loriiXAh UF 1301'A>Y 



species had petioles of Kalymma structure, containing a number of 

 luesarcli bundles. In all of them the medullary ra}^s are usually 

 multiseriate, but in one specimen, referred to C. annularis, they are 

 narrow. In G. fascicular is {Eristophyton fascicular^ Zalesskv"), 

 a British species, the leaf -trace strands, where they leave the small 

 pith, are centrally mesarch, of large size, and perfectly similar to 

 those of C. Saturni. Lower down in their course they dimhilsh in 

 size and the centripetal portion becomes much reduced. Tlie ])roto- 

 xylem divides into two as the trace jjasses through the secondary 

 wood. In C. Beinertiana (^Eristophyton Beinertianum Zalesskv) 

 (British and Silesian) the pith is large and contains sclerotic nests, 

 absent in all the other species. The xylem-strands resemble those of 

 the preceding species, but become actually endarch in the lower part 

 of their course. In both the " Eristophyton " species the medullary 

 rays are narrow and the wood has a Cordaitean character. The 

 petioles are unknown. While the generic separation of Eristo- 

 phyton from Galamopitys may ultimately be justified, all the five 

 species form a natural series, in which O. Saturni occupies in certain 

 respects an intermediate position between C. annularis and C. ameri- 

 cana, on the one hand, and the " Eristophyton " species, on the other. 

 The whole series of species here included in the genus Calamo- 

 pitys appears to belong to the Cycadofilices, the nearest athnity 

 being with the Lyginopteridese, through Heteranr/ium. The great 

 development of the primary wood is a primitive chai-acter, indicating 

 that even the " Eristophyton " species had probably not advanced 

 very far in a Gymnospermous direction, though in other characters 

 they show some approach towards the Cordaitese. 



At the meeting of the same Society on Nov. 29, Dr. Harold 

 Wao-er read a paper on "Intensity and Direction of Light as Factors 

 in Phototropism " and another on "Sphere-Coloration in the 

 AqaricacecB " — a matter which was treated by the late W. Gr. Smith 

 in his " Clavis Agaricinorum " published with illustrations showing 

 the colour-distribution of spores, in this Journal for 1870. Dr. Wager 

 stated that the use of spore-coloration as a basis for the classifica- 

 tion of the Agaricacece is artificial and imperfect. There is no clear 

 line of demarcation between the various colours, and the designation 

 of the colours in the text-books is very indefinite and unsatisfactory. 

 A beo-innino-, has, however, been made by members of the Myco- 

 logical Committee of the Yorkshire Naturalists' Union to obtain 

 more accurate records of spore-coloration in terms of a standard 

 series of tints, such as that of the Code des Couleurs by Klincksieck 

 & Valette (Paris, 1908). He has already found — and this may be 

 a fact of some considerable physiological interest — that, with one or 

 two doubtful exceptions, all the spore colours so far standardized, 

 whether pink rusty, or purple, fall within the region of the less 

 refrano-ible half of the spectrum. Spectroscopic examination also 

 shows this. It has been suggested by Buller that these colouring- 

 matters may serve a useful purpose by screening off certain of the 

 sun's rays from the living protoplasm. If this is so, we ought to find 

 some support for the hypothesis in the more abundant distribution of 

 the coloured-spored species in the open and the white-spored forms in 



