REJUVENESCENCE IN NATURE. 271 



globular cases of Saprolegnia. The spores are flat- 

 compressed, however, before their separation, longish 

 afterwards; their colour is green at first, subsequently 

 brown. The number of spores in C. pulvinata amounts 

 to 58. 



Finally, I mention here the formation of spores in 

 Sphaeroplea, already described (see p. 164),* as a case 

 which connects the two sections D. 1. and D. 2., the 

 formation of an indefinite abundance of new cells through 

 transformation of contents filling up the entire cavity of 

 the cell, on the one hand, and of contents excavated into 

 a parietal investment, on the other. Before the com- 

 mencement of fructification, the cell-contents oiSpJtteroplea 

 represent a parietal investment, which, however, does not 

 maintain itself as such in the preparatory stage of forma- 

 tion of the reproductive cells, as in the foregoing examples, 

 but collapses entirely, whence the spores produced by its 

 transformation are not seated upon the cell -wall even in 

 their earliest state, but lie free in the cavity of the cell, 

 arranged, according to the proportion of their size to the 

 diameter of the long tubular mother-cell, either in one 

 row, as in Sph. Leibleinii, K., or in two or more, as in 

 Spk. Trevirani, K.f and Braunii, K. From the position 

 of the spores, it would be more correct to apply the term 

 free cell-formation to this, than to the preceding cases ; 

 but even here it is the entire contents, with the mere 

 exclusion of a watery fluid, which break up into a num- 

 ber of newly individualised masses. That these masses 

 separate at their first production, only loosely fill the 

 mother-cell, and are little or not at all in contact, arises 1 

 from the condensation of the contents connected with the 

 formation of resting spores, and the abundant quantity of 

 watery fluid which is thus excluded. All the more con- 

 sistent portions of the contents, the viscid mucilage, the 

 previously annularly arranged chlorophyll, with the 



* (See also Ereseuius, on Sphaeroplea annulina, 'Bol. Zeitung.,' 1851, 

 vol. ix, p. 241. A. H.) 



f Meyen, ' Pflauzeii-phys.,' iii, t. 10, f. 17. 



