94 Sudden Appearance and Constancy, 



has described in his excellent monograph. The whole 

 plant consists of a single branchless stem, which is merely 

 slightly swollen at the limits of every year's growth ; the 

 needles remain adherent for a long time.^ This form 

 has appeared in diverse localities. Schroter records 4 

 examples from Italy, one from Baden, several from 

 Westphalia, ;Mittelfranken and Bohemia, and some from 

 Mariabrunn near Vienna. The majority of these plants 

 reached a height of 1-2 meters, a few of them as much 

 as 5-6 meters ; some of them are still alive 



RiMPAU has described an instance of sterile rye.^ 

 Ears of this rye appeared almost every year during a 

 period of more than ten years; they were often much 

 and sometimes excessively branched, especially in years 

 and localities where the rye was very thin. But as ears 

 of this kind occurred on plants which also bore normal 

 ones, the repeated appearance of the anomaly may per- 

 haps be due to inheritance. 



And lastly, instead of giving a further record of the 

 numerous existing sterile varieties, let me refer to Nitella 

 syncarpa, which has recently been described by A. Ernst, 

 and which bears, instead of oogonia, incompletely devel- 

 oped antheridia which never produce spermatozoids.^ 

 The examples in question w^ere observed near Ziirich, 

 and were completely sterile. 



* See p. 6^ and C. Schroter. Uchcr die FicJifc (Picca cxcclsa 

 Link) Vierteljahrsschr. d. nat. Ges. in Ziirich, Jahrg. XLIIT, 1898, 

 Parts 2 and 3, pp. 50-53, Fig. 18. This vahia1)le work contains a 

 very full review of the varieties, forms, and monstrosities of this 

 highly "variable" tree. 



^Deutsche laiid'Zi'irlhschafflichc Prcssc, Berlin, October 4, 1899, 

 where photographs of monstrous ears of rye are given. 



^ Alfred Ernst, Ueber Pseudo-Hcrmaphroditismus bci Nitella 

 syncarpa. Flora, 1901, Vol. 88, Part I, with Plates I-III. 



