570 DR. J. B. HICKS ON THE GONIDIA AND 
The observations of Br. Caspary *, which show that Chroolepus produces zoospores, 
are not inimical to this view, as will be pointed out in the course of the following 
remarks. In addition I may also add that I have often observed the peculiar form 
of the end-cells giving off these zoospores, as figured by him in the older confervoid 
filaments of Mosses. 
The gonidia mentioned by Kiitzing (in the characters of Frotonema) as being thrown 
off from the filament were first noticed by him f, who also showed that they sprouted 
out again into a filament, but that whilst free they were globular and then looked like 
frotococcus-cells. 
Beyond this point in their history, and the knowledge of their " peculiar fruit " (tu- 
bercles, Schimper) and the propagules of Schimper, I am not aware that any one has 
preceded me in the observations about to follow. Before proceeding further, it will be 
useful to describe more particularly the " confervoid filaments." 
They consist of a single series of cells, of a length varying according to outward con- 
ditions, each cell possessing the property of forming branches like themselves. They 
are, in the first instance, produced by the germination of a spore, as has been pointed 
out by the observers above quoted ; and although, as Schimper } has beautifully shown, 
the ascending axis arises from them, yet the axis and the leaves in their turn give 
rise to the filaments, as Kiitzing § and Schimper also have pointed out, and which can 
be readily verified. 
When the filament springs from either axis or leaf, or from a single unsegmented goni- 
dium, the first change in the cell (for in either case only one cell is involved) is a bulging 
out of a portion of its wall, which, after growing a certain length, is shut off from the 
original cell by a septum at the point of origin || (PI. LVII. fig. 2). After this cell has 
grown a certain length, a binary subdivision of its contents takes place, upon the 
common to that form of parietal cell-formation f . 
Quart 
t 
t 
|| This corresponds with Nageli's description of cell-formation in the Conferva; (Ray Soc. 1845, p. 260) :— " The 
cell-formation occurs in a similar manner when a cell grows out sideways from the stem to produce a branch. The 
septum is then produced between the newly outgrown and the original portions of the cell. The cell-contents also 
remain unaltered here while the septum is becoming apparent." Again (Ray Soc. 1849, p. 141), "A cell 
grows out into a branch, and divides by parietal cell-formation into two cells, in such a way that one corresponds to 
the original cavity of the cell, the other to the expanded part. Here are to be enumerated the formation of 
branches in Algae, Fungi, Florideae, &c. It probably exists in all plants, but may be recognized best in organs com- 
posed of rows of cells." 
^f "The 
While 
formation 
dissepiment 
membrane i 
in addition, directs attention here more particularly to the primordial utricle, bounding and cutting off the two parts 
from each other, even before the origin of the cellulose dissepiment. According to this representation, the septum is 
formed by the two individualized portions of contents into which the mother cell divides, and which secrete cellulose 
upon their whole surface after they become separately constituted, touching by their flat adjacent surfaces, whence, of 
course, the cellulosp lavpr« €nr™*A ^ n *o^ ™~iv • . . « . , , . , . 
septum, which, however, from the nature of its origin, is composed of two plates. Referring to the ab origine 
existing contact of the daughter cells with the whole internal surface of the wall of the mother cell in the formation of 
