184 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [MARCH 
When the chromosomes are being drawn into an equatorial plate 
figure, as also when they have begun to recede to the polar 
figures, the fibers are more frequently found converging to a 
single point, though multipolar monaxial figures are the more 
characteristic. Certain cells from material fixed in Flemming 
show but traces of the achromatic figure, such traces being con- 
fined to the linin connecting adjacent chromosomes (/igs. 32, 33): 
Fixatives such as chrom-acetic accentuate the fibrillar character 
of the plasm, while that of Flemming accentuates the granular 
character, showing fewer intercytoplasmic spaces. Compare 
fig. 33 Flemming with fig. 37 chrom-acetic. 
Thus the evidence from the preparations examined points to 
the conclusion that the achromatic figure in Allium is derived 
from both cytoplasm and the elongated nucleus ; that the cyto- 
plasmic fibrillae normally fuse with the nuclear reticulum with- 
out the intervention of periplast formation, and form a multipo- 
lar monaxial spindle which may secondarily become bipolar. 
The observations of other investigators regarding the achro- 
matic figure in the division of meristematic cells is as follows: 
Rosen (8) stated that in the cells of root tips of hyacinth a 
homogeneous plasm collects in a thin hyaline layer about the 
nucleus destined to divide. This layer he found to be concen- 
trated at the opposite poles in the form of two conical caps in 
which rows of fibrillae originated close to the nuclear membrane. 
Hof (11) stated that in Ephedra kinoplasmic bodies forming 
caps appeared simultaneously: at the two diametrically opposite 
points of the nuclear surface. The polar caps soon took on the 
shape of sharp pointed spheres. In the interior of these spheres 
delicate threads form which finally fasten to the nuclear surface. 
Némec (9) describes the fundament of the spindle as being 
bipolar in orientation from the beginning, appearing as a hyaline 
formation surrounding the nucleus and in the form of caps at the 
poles. He designated such caps as “ periplasts.”’ In another 
contribution upon the nuclear division of Solanum tuberosum he 
stated that, whereas in normal cells a hyaline periplast is formed 
as in Allium, in cells taken from woufided tubercles the threads 
grew out directly from the nuclear surface. He considered that 
