ON THE NOMENCLATURE OP THE SEXUAL ORGANS. 339 



groups of plants or of aniiuals, is establislied beyond all reason- 

 able doubt, the victory should be signalized by a simplitication of 

 terminology. 



The most serious question which occurs to one in connection 

 with Mr. Gibson's proposals, is whether it will be possible to 

 persuade botanists to drop the use of the words ovary and ovule, 

 in their present incorrect and misleading sense. If only morpho- 

 logists were as strict as systematists in questions of nomenclature 

 this would have to be done : the morphology of the parts in 

 question being now thoroughly understood, to call a macro- 

 sporange an ovule, or part of a sporophyll an ovary, is, and ought 

 to be considered, as great a misdemeanour as it would be for the 

 discoverer of a new beetle to name it Canis familiar is or Qiiercus 

 robur. Neither botanists nor zoologists, as such, appreciate the 

 mischievous nature of errors embalmed in words such as those 

 referred to : it is only when animals and plants are studied from 

 the common, or " biological " standpoint, that the pressure is felt, 

 and a teacher feels that he would give a great deal not to be 

 obliged to confuse the already overburdened memories of his 

 students by using the same word for two structures, which have 

 no possible connections with one another, or, by using different 

 words for structures the undoubted homology of which he has to 

 insist on. 



Although I should like to see most of Mr. Gibson's suggestions 

 adopted, there are certain objections which occur to me. In the 

 tirst place I would retain the terms gonad ( = reproductive organ), 

 ^ame<e ( = conjugating body), and zygote (= product of conjuga- 

 tion) as general terms, using the names spermary and ovary for 

 differentiated male and female gonads ; sperm and ovum for 

 male and female gametes ; zygospore for a resting cell or non- 

 motile zygote formed by the conjugation of equal and similar 

 gametes ; zygozoospore for a similarly formed motile zygote ; and 

 oosperm for a zygote formed by the union of ovum and sperm. 



In the second place I object to Mr. Gibson's use of the word 

 embryo as the equivalent of oospore ( = oosperm : this word is 

 applicable to the young organism up to the time of hatching or of 

 germination, and it is certainly convenient to have the means of 

 distinguishing the fertilized egg-cell or unicellular embryo (oosperm) 

 from the nmlticellular embryo formed from its diA'ision, and 

 known as morula, gastrula, embryo of a ripe seed, itc. 



In the case of plants exhibiting onetagenesis, Mr. Gil)son 

 proposes the term gamophyte for the sexual generation, on the 

 ground that the words oophyte and oophore suggest the production 

 of ova, and not of reproductive products of either sex, which is 

 the real point to emphasize. But here it appears to me that Mr. 

 Gibson is not true to the leading idea of his paper. If the 

 terminology in the case in question is to be reformed, what we 

 want is names which will apply equally to animals and plants. 



