158 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [august 



fermentation. In other fungi also 



find 



in the spores of the Mucorales nor in sclerotia until germination or growth has i 



gun. In 



I 



sporulation in yeast. The young spores are frequently surrounded by fatty 

 substances in the early stages of formation. The nucleus divides amitotically 

 both in budding and in spore formation, and one to four spores are formed. 

 In the first case the cell nucleus becomes the spore nucleus directly. Often a 

 nucleus which does not produce a spore remains in the cytoplasm of the mother 

 cell after the spores are formed. — H. Hasselbring. 



Supernumerary pollen grains of Fuchsia. — Beer'^ has investigated Fuchsia, ^ 



whose pollen mother cells are recorded as producing five to fourteen micro- 

 spores. He found frequently six to ten microspores within a single cell, and a 

 study of the nuclear divisions led to the conclusion that these high numbers are 

 due to the occurrence of irregularities in the distribution of the chromosomes during 

 anaphase, as described by Juel for Hemerocallis. The chromosomes move very 

 unevenly toward the poles, and some, either singly or in groups, lag behind and 

 often become cut off entirely from the two main chromosome groups. Usually 

 these separated chromosomes give rise to distinct nuclei, which vary in size accord- i 



ing to the number of chromosomes they contain. During the second division the I 



small as well as the large nuclei produce distinct spindles and divide. The ^ 



second division is much more regular than the first, and no supernumerary nuclei 

 were obser\'ed to originate at this stage. The small pollen grains are as definitely . 

 organized as the large ones, so far as the usual walls and their composition are 

 concerned. — J. M. C. 



Embryo sac of Peperomia. — ^Johnson^^ has discovered in a delicate, shade- 

 loving, Jamaican species of PeperomJa (P. hispidula) an interesting variation of 

 the well-known situation in P. felhtdda. There is a single hypodermal arche- 

 sporial cell, which cuts off a tapetal cell. The mother cell develops the embryo 

 sac directly, the first four free nuclei being "arranged in a perfect tetrad.'* At 

 the next division a distinct polarity is developed, two nuclei passing to the micropy- 

 lar end of the sac, and the other six grouping at the antipodal end. At the next 

 division the Peperomia condition of sixteen free nuclei is reached, four being 

 micropylar and twelve antipodal. A well-defined egg and one synergid are 

 organized, the two remaining micropylar nuclei passing toward the center of the 

 sac, where they encounter the twelve antipodal nuclei. The whole group of 

 fourteen nuclei fuses into one great fusion nucleus. The division of this fusion 

 nucleus is accompanied by wall-formation, and an endosperm tissue of about 

 forty cells is developed. — J. M. C. 



*7 Beer, Rudolf, The supernumerary pollen grai|is of Fuchsia. Annals of 

 Botany 21:305-307, 1907. 



*8 Johnson, D. S., A new type of embryo sac in Peperomia. Johns Hopkins 

 Univ. Circ. 1907: no. 3. 19-21. ph. 5~6. 



