248 Mr. II. J. Carter on Fecundation 



Perhaps Elirenberg's Cryptomonas lenticularis, being without 

 eye-spot or eilia^ is a "stilP^ form of it; but it approaches 

 nearest of all to his genus Cnjptoylena. 



I found this little Alga (for such in the end it must be con- 

 sidered) on the 2nd of July, in company with another heart- 

 shaped Cryptoglena, which will be desci'ibed presently, in great 

 numbers in a little portion of shallow water connected by the 

 rain with a pit into which the drainings of a buffalo-shed were 

 received. With them v/ere also Evrjlena Acus, Eudorina eJegans 

 (undergoing the process of fecundation above described), Uvella 

 Budo, Ehr,, and here and there Euglena viridis; but the bulk of 

 the organisms present consisted of the two first-mentioned ; the 

 rest, with the exception of Eughna Acus, were only now and 

 then seen. 



While examining some of this water, I was struck with the 

 number of deciduous loricre present, some of which were split 

 into halves which were separated, while others only adhered 

 together anteriorly, and })rescnted a pair of cilia attached to their 

 point of union (figs. 25—27) ; and on looking round for their 

 origin, it was soon found that they belonged to the Cryptoglcna 

 above described, for the internal cell of that organism was in 

 several instances seen escaping from them, not only singly, but 

 after having undergone duplicative subdivision into two, four, 

 eight, sixteen, thirty-two, or sixty-four gonidia (figs. 20-24). 

 Moreover, it was observed that each of these groups came forth 

 in a delicate cell (the protoplasmic sac*), which, by imbibition 

 of water, became distended, in some instances, to two or three 

 times the diameter of the lorica, and, thus assuming a globular 

 form in the four-, eight- and sixteen- divisions, w^re un distinguish- 

 able from Chlamydococcus under similar forms (figs. 22, 23), — a 

 point which still more nearly allies these organisms. 



Still seeking for more of these varieties, it was observed that 

 the first division, viz. that in which the internal cell came forth 

 with only two gonidia, was invariably surrounded by a swarm of 

 from ten to twenty much smaller gonidia (figs. 26, 27), which, 

 on turning to the sixty-four division, were found to be identical, 

 to all appearance, with the gonidia of this degree, of which there 

 were numerous instances present, not only where the lorica was 

 as yet unruptured, but where the internal cell had been liberated 

 and the group were swarming within it, and where this cell had 

 also become ruptured, and the gonidia were issuing one after 

 another through the opening (fig. 25). 



Now, the only organism present which was undergoing this sub- 

 division being this Cryptoglena, and this, therefore, being the only 



* See " Fecundation of CEdogonium" Annals, 3 ser. vol. i. p. 31, note. 



