134 Minnesota Plant Life. 



In two grooves along the stalk root-hairs are produced. The 

 fruit-branch now resembles in outward appearance a small 

 green-headed toadstool attached to the broad flat branch below. 

 In the cone-headed liverwort there are, apparently, two kinds 

 of branches, the ordinary vegetative and the special repro- 

 ductive branches which bear the capsules. If one of the cone- 

 heads be separated from the main stem in autumn or in early 

 spring, it will be found that imbedded in the under side of the 

 cone and surrounding the cavity about the stalk lies a ring 

 of black capsules inclosed apparently in the tissue of the cone. 

 The number of these capsules varies from three to eight, not 

 usually exceeding the latter number. With the point of a pin 

 they may be dissected out, if the little cones are handled with 

 sufficient care and tact. Each capsule removed from the tis- 

 sues which were surrounding it will be found to show over most 

 of its surface a dull black color. But at the end, where the 

 pear-shaped body was imbedded most deeply, for a little dis- 

 tance the color is green. With very great care, by the use of 

 a sharp pin-point it is possible to remove an exterior membrane 

 from the body which was dissected out of the cone-head and 

 when this close outer membrane is separated a little object of a 

 shiny black color, except at the pointed end where the color is 

 bright green, will be obtained. If it has not been broken in 

 the process of extraction it may now be split in the palm of the 

 hand and a brown or blackish mass of spores and accessory cells 

 may be removed from the interior. The shiny black capsule 

 is the fruit-body developed from the liverwort egg and consists 

 of a small, short green stalk or foot and a larger capsular por- 

 tion, the whole constituting a slender pear-shaped object about 

 a sixteenth of an inch in length. 



In the cone-headed liverwort and in all its allies, mingled with 

 the spores in each capsule, are certain very curious cells with 

 microscopic spiral bands or hoops developed on the inner sur- 

 faces of their walls. These cells are of an elongated spindle- 

 shape and their spiral bands are very sensitive to moisture. 

 When placed under a powerful lens and moistened by the breath 

 these cells writhe and struggle in a remarkable fashion, owing 

 to the alternate shortening and lengthening of their spiral bands. 

 The movement is not a vital one, but purely physical, like the 



