1849.] Linnean Society. 61 



November 20. 



William Yarrell, Esq., V.P., in the Chair. 



George Frederick Samuel Robinson, Lord Viscount Goderich, and 

 Alfred Tyler, Esq., F.G.S., were elected Fellows. 



Mr. Hogg, F.L.S., presented two spikes of a variety of Hordeum 

 hexastichon, L., grown from seeds sown in March of the present year 

 at Norton in the county of Durham. The seed was derived from 

 some found in the pocket of a sailor, who died during a voyage in 

 the Mediterranean. Mr. Hogg designates this variety as H. hex- 

 astichon var. semimbus nigi'is sen cceruleo-nigris, " black, or rather 

 blue-black Bigg." H'e states that he cannot find in authors any de- 

 scription at all answering to it, although Fersoon and Seringe men- 

 tion a similar variety of the common barley, Hordeum vulgare, L. 

 The variety presented by Mr. Hogg ripens early, is exceedingly 

 prolific, and has large grains ; and he therefore considers it worthy 

 of cultivation, and though perhaps not so w-ell adapted to malting 

 as the common barley, yet likely to be valuable for other purposes, 

 and particularly for the fattening of cattle. 



Read a Paper " On the Development of the Spores and Elaters of 

 Marchantia polymorpha." By Arthur Henfrey, Esq., F.L.S. &c. 



Mr. Henfrey commences by referring to the memoirs of M. Mir- 

 bel on Marchantia, &c., and the accompanying note of Mr. Griffith ; 

 to M. Lindenberg's Monogi'aph of Ricciece; and to the several pub- 

 lications of BischofF, Von Mohl, Gottsche and Fitt on the develop- 

 ment of the spores of various cryptogamic plants. He briefly de- 

 scribes the development of the little green cellular body found within 

 the pistillidium which becomes the capsule oi Marchantia polymorjiha, 

 and states that from the facts observed and from analogy he is in- 

 clined to believe that the young capsule is at first formed of a con- 

 tinuous cellular substance, 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 continuous cellular tissue of 

 anthers. M. Mirbel does not appear to have examined the contents 

 of the capsules until this complete separation of the cells had taken 

 place, when he describes them as consisting of minute elongated 

 cells (the young elaters) mingled with small squarish cells (the 



