i86 WILLIAM GRIFFITH 



simplest expression to an " amnios " or embryo-sac And he 

 observed the extension of the embryo-sacs up the style and 

 the union of the pollen tube with the tip of the embryo-sac. 

 His further description of the development of the embryo, 

 endosperm and fruit is wonderfully exact if we allow for his 

 regarding the long suspensor bearing the embryo as derived 

 from the pollen tube growing down through the long embryo- 

 sac. 



Grififith thus recognised all the main peculiarities of Viscum 

 and of Loranthus subsequently described more in detail in 

 European species by Hofmeister (whose analysis of Griffith's 

 work in 1859 is a great testimony to its accuracy) and later by 

 Treub in the tropical species which had been studied by Griffith. 



The Balanophoraceae was another group, on which Griffith 

 made pioneer investigations. He collected and examined all 

 the species he met with, partly from the systematic interest 

 in supporting Robert Brown's objection to Lindley's class of 

 Rhizantheae, but still more from his interest in the details of 

 their reproduction. An examination of the plates from his 

 memoirs, only published after his death, in the Linnean Trans- 

 actions will show how fully he was aware of the structure of the 

 archegonium-like female flower of Balanophora ; of the relation 

 of the pollen-grains and pollen tubes to it; and of the appearance 

 of the endosperm which he mistook for the embryo. Throughout 

 he compares the structure with the pistillum (archegonium) of 

 Bryophyta. 



Thus in the Balanophoraceae also Griffith laid the foundations 

 on which the work of Hofmeister, and more recently that of 

 Treub and Lotsy follow. 



When at Malacca Griffith interested himself among many 

 other problems in the ovule and the development of the seed 

 of Avicennia. He had previously paid attention to the vivi- 

 parous embryos of other Mangroves. This piece of work, when 

 compared with Treub's re-examination oi Avicennia, brings out 

 so clearly Griffith's accuracy, so far as his means of observa- 

 tion allowed him to go, that we may look for a moment at how 

 these two investigations, separated by forty years, compare. 



Griffith recognised the development of the embryo-sac in 



