384 Botanical Society of Edinburgh. 



hundreds of pollen-tubes may be seen in the centre of the style, many 

 in the axis of the ovary, and generally one in each micropyle. The 

 following is a summary of the results of many experiments on this 

 plant : — 



1 . The pollen-tube grows at the rate of an inch in four hours, and 

 under very favourable circumstances (as under great heat and moist- 

 ure) twice as rapidly. 



2. The polleu-tube is not a simple tubular prolongation of the 

 inner membrane (intine) of the pollen-grain, except to a certain 

 distance. It is in reality composed of a series of cells, the first of 

 which is formed from the intine, the second is formed within the 

 papillose cells of the stigma, the third near the axis of the style, and 

 the others at varying distances. The last cell is usually at the spot 

 in the ovary where the tube perforates the cell-wall of the ovary to 

 enter tlie canal of the micropyle of the ovule. Each cell is divided 

 from that above and below by a more or less perfect involution of the 

 external cell-wall. 



3. The pollen-tube passes through the stigma by a regular process 

 of cell-growth. Afterwards cell after cell is added to the tube by 

 a process of division, each cell performing its function independently. 



4. No germinal vesicles exist in the embryo-sac of the Tigridia ; 

 the pollen-tube effuses its contents into the sac with whose granular 

 contents a mixture occurs, and the embryo is evolved out of this 

 mixture. 



3. "Notes on the Chaulmoogra Seeds of India," by Charles Mur- 

 chison, M.D., M.R.C.P.L. 



A bland fixed oil from these seeds, furnished by the Chaulmooffra 

 odorata, Roxb., is used by the natives of India in various cutaneous 

 diseases. 



4. "On the Gutta Percha plant of India," by Dr. Cleghorn. 

 Records the discovery of it in several parts of Peninsular India. 



5. "Notice of the Flowering of Agave americana," by Joseph 

 Lister, F.R.C.S.E. 



In 18.55, at an age of at least fifty years, the Aloe flowered, and 

 afterwards a small offshoot appeared above the earth, which, instead 

 of being a small leafy repetition of its parent, bore no leaves, but two 

 flowers like those produced a few months previously by the central 

 stem. This offshoot consisted of a succulent underground stem, 

 about 1 inches long, connected with the underground part of the 

 main plant. It was also found that there were about a dozen other 

 offshoots struggling vipwards through the earth, terminated by pale 

 green buds, which, in the case of two that I dissected, contained 

 rudimentary flowers. Thus the whole constitution of the Aloe appears 

 to have been remarkably affected with a tendency to flowering ; and 

 just as the part above ground shot forth a stem with a multitude of 

 flower-buds, so the underground portion, instead of sending out a few 

 sprouts terminating in leaf-buds, produced a dozen or more offshoots 

 ending in flower-buds and destitute of leaves. 



