172 Fertilization 



other. 7 What will happen to these first parts of the band 

 at the first divisions of the young plant? Evidently, in 

 the case described by de Bary, the first cell-division will, 

 by cutting the band through in the middle, give the ma- 

 ternal half to one daughter-cell and the paternal half to 

 the other. In 5. Weberi the two subsequent divisions will 

 do this ; the middle cells of the four-celled thread will then 

 bear the paternal, the two end-cells, the maternal band. 



The result of this speculation is, that, for the individ- 

 ual cells of a one-spiraled Spirogyra-thread, it makes no 

 difference whether they get their chlorophyll-band from 

 the father or from the mother. However, there is no 

 doubt but that all the bands of the young plant possess, 

 later, the same hereditary characters, even though there 

 were individual differences between father and mother. 

 We must therefore assume that they necessarily got these 

 from the nucleus, after fertilization. If we attribute to 

 the process of conjugation any significance at all for the 

 active hereditary characters, and do not wish to restrict 

 its effect, through all generations, to the nuclei, we are 

 evidently compelled to accept this assumption. 



But in this case the necessity of a transmission of the 

 hereditary characters from the fertilized nucleus to the 

 other organs of the protoplasts, lies before us in a simple 

 illustration. 



We will generalize this theory, and say that in the 

 entire plant world it is indifferent for the new individual 

 whether, with the exception of the nucleus, it gets the 

 organs of its protoplasts from the father or the mother. 



7 In other cases the chlorophyll-band of the male cell is dis- 

 organized and resorbed. Cf. Chmielevsky. V. Eine Notiz iiber das 

 Verhalten der Chlorophyllbander in den Zygoten der Spirogyraar- 

 ten. Bot. Zeit. 48: 773. 1890. 



