SPECIAL MORPHOLOGY I CHARvE. ] 63 



the more complicated Chara, as the object of his examination, the 

 former affording an example of one of the simplest cases of this kind of 

 germination. In some species we find, instead of branches inserted in 

 a circle, short thick cells, which, however, are also placed in a whorl, 

 and filled with large starch-granules, and from these new plants are 

 developed under favourable circumstances. We certainly cannot call 

 these buds ( 93.). As the plants grow entirely in water, every cell 

 having an independent vitality, as it were, the plant increases up- 

 wards as it is constantly decaying below, and hence there can be no 

 trace of any root -like development. In the axils of the branches, where 

 also a few spherical cells exist, repetitions of the whole plant (buds) are 

 formed from newly generated cells, and, on the plant dying off to one of 

 these spots, each new plant generated from one of the buds is indepen- 

 dently developed. As, in the stage of which we speak, there is, of course, 

 no difference to be perceived between stem and frond, the word " bud " 

 can only have a general signification, and not the more definite meaning 

 which it acquires in the Gymnosporce. Of the motion of sap in the cells 

 of the Chara we have already spoken ( 40.). 



A treatise on- " the development of the Chara, by Karl Miiller," (Bo- 

 tanical Journal of von Mohl and Schlechtendal, 1845. p. 393.,) which 

 appears to be a most carefully written work, unfortunately did not come 

 into my hands soon enough for me to do more here than call attention 

 to it. 



92. On the lateral branches, generally in the axil of the above- 

 mentioned pair of cells, five cells may be seen spirally wound round 

 a thick mass, and having their parallel extremities surrounded by a 

 kind of pentagonal crown. From this thick granular mass, a large 

 cell (spore) is formed, filled with large granules of starch, mucus 

 and oil globules, and with a substance that closely invests the 

 spore-cells, and, from being at first transparent, subsequently be- 

 comes green or red, and finally black. The five investing cells 

 then either become cartilaginous, and remain until the whole 

 decays after germination ; or they are converted into a gela- 

 tinous state, and then speedily dissolved after the sporocarp has 

 fallen. Close below this sporocarp there may generally be seen, 

 at the same time, seated upon a short cylindrical cell, another 

 cell, which is at first simple and spherical, but from which eight 



Sqy. always eight?) cells are gradually developed, which become 

 attened, and enclose a cavity that appears from its origin to be 

 filled with a dense grumous mass. The eight cells expand into 

 closely compressed radii, arranged side by side, increasing the 

 circumference and depth of the whole body, whilst red granules 

 are gradually deposited upon their inner wall. The dark contents 

 are meanwhile developed into other cells, so that in the perfect organ 

 a conical cell projects, from the cell forming the pedicle, into the 

 cavity, and a cylindrical cell is formed from the middle of each of the 

 eight cells of the wall. These new cells, which likewise contain 

 pale-red granules, bear on their free extremity several spherical or 

 truncated cylindrical cells, from which project many long filaments 

 composed of minute cells. The spherical cells and the filaments 



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