26 Prof. F. Schmitz on the 
assume that the process of conjugation takes place in exactly 
the same way as in Gleosiphonia, but that it is effected much 
more rapidly than in that genus, so that direct observation of 
the conjugation-stages is perfectly a matter of chance. Not- 
withstanding all my endeavours, however, chance has not 
hitherto been favourable to me in the present forms (which 
are also difficult of investigation in other respects). Never- 
theless at present I would not doubt of the occurrence of a 
true conjugation of these two cells. 
It is true that it is quite possible that there may be a 
migration of the protoplasm (with the cell-nucleus) of the ovi- 
cell into the auxiliary cell wrthout complete conjugation of 
the two cells (as in the fertilization of the Phanerogamia *, of 
many Peronosporee [ Phytophthora, Peronosporat], Krysiphex, 
&c.) through the separating membranes }, that is fine pores 
(not micellar interstices) of these membranes. But the analogy 
of the nearly allied Floridean genera, which distinctly show a 
complete conjugation of these two cells, appears to me still 
too weighty to allow me to decide in favour of this latter 
assumption so long as we have no certain demonstration upon 
a readily accessible object of the non-occurrence of conjuga- 
tion §. 
After this migration of the protoplasm (that is, of the cell- 
nucleus) of the fertilized ovicell into the auxiliary cell, the 
latter commences a very rapid new growth, which leads to the 
development of a fruit-body. This growth, however, takes 
place in the above-mentioned individual groups in very diffe- 
rent manners, and the consequence of this is the very different 
structure and habit of the different forms of fruits ||. 
* Strasburger, ‘Befruchtung und Zelltheilung,’ p, 58 ; ‘ Bau und Wachs- 
thum der Zellhiute,’ p. 247; Sitzungsber. d. Ges. f. Nat.- und Heilk. zu 
Bonn, December 4, 1882. 
+ De Bary, ‘ Beitrage zur Morphologie und Physiologie der Pilze,’ 4te 
Reihe, pp. 72, 73. 
t See also Pringsheim’s description of the passage of amceboidal plasma- 
masses through the membrane of the antheridial tube of Achlya colorata 
(Sitzungsb. Akad. Wiss. Berlin, 1882, p. 870). 
§ The fact that I have myself for a long time endeavoured in vain to 
demonstrate such a conjugation in the easily accessible species of Calli- 
thamnion, Spermothamnion, and G'riffithsia, would certainly seem to lend 
support to the notion that here there is really no conjugation of the cells 
in question. 
|| To enter in more detail into the further development of the cysto- 
carp in the various genera of Floridez would lead us too far. But one 
of these forms of fruit needs special mention, as it has been affirmed to 
have a parthenogenetic origin. 
Thus while in the majority of the species of Callithamnion the spore- 
complex into which the single auxiliary cell grows constitutes a dense and 
close tuft of filaments, a close cell-body (favella), this spore-complex in 
