013 



severe winter weather. A comparative table showing the time of* 

 flowering of different plants during the two seasons accompanied the 

 communication. 



A communication was read from Mr. George Lawson, Edinburgh, 

 on the occurrence of Nematelia virescens, a fungus found on the Sid- 

 law Hills, and new to the Forfarshire flora. 



A mounted collection of British and foreign grasses, and other 

 plants, was exhibited as a donation to the Association from D. E. 

 Smith, Esq., Edinburgh. Plants were also received from Mr. Geo. 

 B. Simpson and Mr. W. M. Ogilvie. 



Note on Count Suminskis Recent Observations on the Reproduction 



of Ferns. 



These observations are so valuable, and place the subject under 

 discussion in so novel and so interesting a light, that we hope shortly 

 to devote several pages to an analysis of the author's remarks: at 

 present this brief note must suffice. 



Prior to the publication of Suminski's work our knowledge of the 

 reproduction of ferns may be thus stated. The frond of a fern bears 

 on its back, edge, or elsewhere, certain clusters of somewhat spherical 

 bodies, each supported on a short stalk : these bodies burst by a fis- 

 sure transverse to their axis, and scatter a quantity of minute particles. 

 The particles falling on the ground, or becoming attached to any 

 moist substance, vegetate and produce a flat, semitransparent, per- 

 fectly cellular leaf, much resembling a Marchantia, from the upper 

 surface of which a true circinate frond is subsequently developed, and 

 this is rapidly followed by others until the plant has assumed its or- 

 dinary appearance, and the Marchantiform leaf has decayed and dis- 

 appeared. Although called by a variety of very curious and ingenious 

 names, authors are agreed in considering the spherical bodies the re- 

 presentatives of capsules, and the particles which they contain the 

 representatives of seeds. 



Suminski, applying the microscope to the upper surface of the 

 Marchantiform leaf while yet in a very young state, has detected cer- 

 tain minute sessile bodies which he considers analogous to the stamens 

 and pistils of flowering plants: the stamens or antheridia are some- 

 what spherical, and are generally seated near the base or that part of 



