ON LICHENOUS FRUCTIFICATION ON ALG. 27 
first casting, minus even the previous chance in its slipping 
round under the pressure of the razor. 
I have advocated the use of pith, even, it may be, to the 
disparagement of the invaluable paraffin and wax. I feel, 
however, warranted in so doing, convinced as I am that not 
only unexceptional results may be easily obtained by pith, 
but that much valuable time may be saved. 
As to the quality of the specimens obtained, I am almost 
converted to the belief that it matters but little, except in 
one or two cases, how or in what one imbeds, but that a good 
result is rather owing to the skill and ingenuity of the mani- 
pulator in each particular case. Every one upholds, natu- 
rally, the way in which he himself is accustomed to work, 
and rightly so; yet I question very much whether a more 
expeditious method of imbedding than that described is in 
any one’s hands. Its easy portability and the complete 
absence of the necessity for all accessory instruments, such 
as tripods, spirit lamps, dishes, paper boxes, and the like, 
may be placed last, even though it may be least, among the 
advantages to be obtained by the use of elder pith. 
On APpoTHECIA occurring in some ScYTONEMATOUS and 
SrrosiPHONACEOUS ALG#, im ADDITION to those PRE- 
VIOUSLY KNown. By Wiutiiam ArcHer, M.R.I.A. 
(With Plate III.) 
Ir is now some years since, upon examining some 
examples of the by no means uncommon plant, long (and 
by some still) accepted as algal, Stigonema atrovirens, Ag., 
that I was attracted by the peculiar enlargements of the 
branches, and was much interested in perceiving that this 
plant showed, embedded in these swellings, distinctly 
lichenous fructification—apothecia, as well as the so-called 
spermogonia. Upon searching out the literature of the 
subject I found from Bornet’s valuable paper that my disco- 
very had been previously well known, and that my specimens 
fully bore out the description he gave, with the exception 
of the hyphe subsequently discovered by Schwendener. 
Bornet, indeed, argued from the fructification which he had 
proved to belong to this form, that it should no longer be 
* Bornet, “ Recherches sur la Structure de /’ Lphebe pubescens,” in ‘ Ann. 
des Sci. Naturelles,’ 3 sér., tom. xviii, p. 155. 
