426 Mr. H. J. Carter on the DevelojJment of Sorastrum, 



spermatic elements, ciliated and active, and of larger germic 

 ones, entirely passive. Hence the reason, to which I have be- 

 fore alluded, for using the term " baby" instead of" daughter 

 groups " for those thus eliminated from Sorastrum. 



How, again, to give a right interpretation to the alteration 

 in the form of the individuals of the parent group which retain 

 their gonimic contents, and lose their spines, apparently by 

 atrophy, I am ignorant. This may be a passive or winter 

 form assumed by the individual ; or if, as in (Edogonium (see 

 my figures, ' Annals,' ser. 3. vol. i. p. 29), a kind of micropyle 

 or opening is formed in the original cell-wall for the entrance 

 of the microgonidia to the spore, then the enlarged green in- 

 dividuals, which become rounded and lose their spines, may 

 be females becoming impregnated and thus passing into spo- 

 rangia instead of into passive winter forms. But, in the 

 absence of more decided proof, I must leave the reader, in this 

 matter, to his own conjecture, merely adding that in no in- 

 stance have I seen the cuneate individual of a parent group 

 producing a series of baby groups endogenously or within its 

 cell-wall, arranged around a central cell, like that observed 

 in the sporangial cell (fig. 4). Nor have I ever seen an indi- 

 vidual of a parent group undergo binary division or fissipari- 

 tion to increase the number of individuals in that group, 

 although it might be conceived that the bilobate condition 

 which I shall have to notice presently might easily lead to 

 this kind of multiplication. 



Thus ends the development of Sorastrum spinulosum, so far 

 as I have been able to pursue it. The formation of the spo- 

 rangium brings us back to that stage which was witnessed on 

 the 18th of July last, where we found the sporangial cell ])ro- 

 ducing sixteen groups ; and Ave must wait for July of 1870, 

 probably, to verify the conclusion that the sporangia now pre- 

 senting themselves are really those of our beautiful little Soras- 

 trum, Meanwhile I hope to keep all safely, with occasional 

 examination, until that time arrives. 



S2')ecies. 



It is too much the custom with naturalists to give a name to 

 every new organism of Avhich they have caught but tlie merest 

 glimpse and could make the roughest representation. Then 

 comes a second, who sees more of the same organism, and 

 therefore gives it another name, and so on ; there may be a 

 third, or more, increasing in a short time the synonymy to 

 such an extent that, with myself, it often threatens to ])ar;)lyzc 

 all further efforts at investigation where it occurs. And wlu re 



