290 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [APRIL 
described. In his anatomical study of Porphyra, Janczewski 
(12) describes the two sorts of sexual cells produced, the 
‘‘antherozoids’’ and the ‘“‘octospores,” and says that he con- 
siders the latter as antheridia whose final segmentation has been 
arrested. He says further: ‘Je considére comme une anthéridie 
le groupe d’anthérozoides siégeant 
dans une maille du réseau, corres- 
pondant a une octospore, et issu par 
conséquent d’une cellule végétative. 
Le développement des anthéridies 
est d’abord tout a fait semblable a 
celui des octospores. II obéit 
ensuite aux mémes régles, et l’on 
dirait que les octospores ne sont 
que des anthéridies dont la segmen- 
Fic. 15.—Portion. of dorsal. tation ultérieure a été arrétée.”’ 
surface of Zanardinia, showing This view suggested to me that 
the emergent sex organs. the conditions sometimes found in a 
bryophyte antheridium might be analogous or even homologous. 
Are the cells which are arrested in division and assume a spheri- 
cal shape (fig. 0) homologous with eggs, and is their appear- 
ance a return to ancestral condition? 
The theory I have outlined would account for sex organs on 
or near both dorsal and ventral surfaces, as they are known to 
occur in Anthoceros, in certain 
thallose jungermannias, and in 
ferns. It would explain the 
sunken sex organs consisting 
of fertile cells not surrounded 
by a wall, formed of sterile Fic. 16.— Lycopodium annotinum: 
sister cells, as the archegonium dorsiventral section of portion of eae 
phyte, showing antheridia of indeterm! 
of Anthoceros and the anther- ecules and ine 
idia of Equisetum and Lyco- 
podium. According to such a theory, existent transitional 
stages might be expected in which the sex organs would not 
have assumed a definite shape nor a definite number of cells. 
Precisely this indeterminate condition is to be found in certain 
. 
rr 
