Fune 17, 1886] 
be cited of the value of science in a commercial and 
national point of view. A great industry was all but 
extinguished, and the impending catastrophe became a 
question for parliaments and statesmen. A scientific 
investigator was appealed to ; he set to work in 1865, and 
after four years’ continued application he had solved the 
problem, and delivered his country from the incubus on 
her industry. It has been well said that Jenner by his 
discovery of vaccination saved more lives than Napoleon 
ever destroyed ; so Pasteur saved France in 1869 from a 
far greater tribute than the Prussian conqueror imposed 
on her in the following year. 
This brilliant success, which could be neither concealed 
nor depreciated, led to the successful experimenter 
(barely recovered from an attack of paralysis, which ended 
his last laborious research) being called on to devise a 
means of checking the ravages of splenic fever (az¢hrax) 
among horses and cattle. Dr. Fleming gives an interest- 
account of this terrible scourge, and explains the methods 
adopted by Pasteur to investigate it. He discovered a 
method by which its virus may be “attenuated,” and 
thus used for protective inoculation in the same way as 
vaccination protects against small-pox. This method, 
though often successful, has not proved uniformly so, and 
more must be done before its general efficiency is es- 
tablished. Dr. Fleming refers to the results in Algeria, in 
Prussia, and in Hungary, and to these he might have added 
those obtained by Dr. Roy in Buenos Ayres. 
On the other hand, the treatment by inoculation of a 
contagious disease among poultry (ill-named choléra des 
poules), a method which was also discovered by Pasteur, 
appears to be uniformly successful. 
The last investigation of the great French experimenter 
is that upon hydrophobia, which the world is still 
anxiously watching. This also is described by Dr. Flem- 
ing. We have kept our readers informed of the progress 
of this vast practical trial of a scientific mode of treatment 
on the victims of a hopeless malady. Every month brings 
fresh accumulation of evidence on the subject, and we 
hope soon to have the report of the Commission sent from 
this country to ascertain M. Pasteur’s precise methods and 
their results. If he should be honoured to be an instru- 
ment in the hands of Providence for averting one of the 
most shocking and terrible diseases to which mankind is 
subject, the name of Pasteur will live as one of the great- 
est benefactors of our race. But in any case his work 
already achieved and its results established form an 
ample title to the admiration and the reverence of all who 
can estimate genius or value its conscientious devotion to 
the service of mankind. 
LYCOPODS* 
HE attention of the readers of NATURE has already 
been directed towards recent work on the Lyco- 
podiacez by the publication of a vésvmé of the researches 
of Dr. M. Treub, Director of the Botanic Gardens of 
Buitenzorg, Java. He is the first botanist who has suc- 
ceeded in giving a connected account of the prothallus, 
sexual organs, and development of the embryo of any 
species of Lycopodium, and now his first paper, which 
dealt with Z. cermuum, has been rapidly followed by a 
still more complete and successful study of Z. Phlegmaria, 
L. It might be expected that the second paper would be 
in great measure a repetition of the first, but this is not 
so; and it may be regarded as one of the most interest- 
ing results of this very suggestive and luminous investiga- 
tion that it brings into prominence the greatness of the pos- 
sible differences in development of two plants which have 
hitherto passed, and will continue to pass, under the same 
generic name. The observations detailed in this second 
paper are so important in their bearings on our views 
t © Btudes sur les Lycopodiacées,” par M. Treub. PartII. Annales du 
Jardin Botantque de Burtenzorg, vol. y. 2i¢me partie, 
NATURE 
145 
regarding other allied forms that it is desirable that at 
least the more striking points should be recorded here. 
Attempts to germinate the spores of Lycopodium 
Philegmaria were at first unsuccessful, but after more than 
a year young plants were found on one of the tree trunks 
on which spores had been sown, and subsequently similar 
young seedlings were found in large numbers in the 
forest. The germination of the spores appears to be slow, 
and Dr. Treub is of opinion that the culture of prothalli 
from spores will never be easy, a view which is supported 
by the fact that the oophore is capable of various modes of 
asexual multiplication ; indeed it appears that the majority 
of the prothalli found owed their origin to this source, and 
not directly to the germination of spores. An autonomous 
existence of the prothallus, independent of the formation 
of sexual organs, has been demonstrated by Goebel in the 
case of Gymnogramme leptophylla, and a similar, but still 
more pronounced condition is found in this Lycopod. 
The prothallus grows in the dead external layers of the 
bark of trees; it is as a rule devoid of chlorophyll, and 
consists of cylindrical branches, covered with absorbing 
hairs. These cylindrical organs branch monopodially, 
the branches being usually formed in acropetal order ; 
they have a terminal growth with two initial cells, each of 
which gives rise to half of the cylindrical organ. It is 
worthy of note that there is a great similarity between 
the structure of this apical meristem and that of the stem 
of the sporophore. In the fully-differentiated parts of the 
prothallus a peripheral tissue one layer of cells in thick- 
ness may be distinguished ; this gives rise to the rhizoids. 
The mass of tissue inclosed by this superficial layer, 
though it shows some slight varieties according to the 
mode of development of the branch, never attains any 
high state of differentiation. 
The lateral branches, which are not very numerous, 
take their origin from the peripheral layer, several cells 
taking part in the formation of each. The growth of 
these branches may be long-continued, and it is not 
arrested on the formation of an embryo on another 
branch. By progressive rotting of the older parts 
branches may be separated from one another, and this 
constitutes the simplest mode of increase in number of 
individuals But, besides this, two other modes of 
vegetative propagation are known—(qa) by ordinary pro- 
pagating organs: these are small ovoid multicellular 
bodies, which originate from single superficial cells, and 
are set free by rupture of their pedicels; (4) by thick- 
walled organs, smaller than the above, which only appear 
on weakly prothalli: these may undergo a period of rest. 
Among the vascular Cryptogams the only organs hitherto 
known of a similar nature to these are those described 
by Cramer; Dr. Treub is, however, of opinion that a 
truer comparison may be be made to the gemme of the 
Hepatice, and especially of BZasza, while in many of their 
general characters, which may be recognised on inspec- 
tion of the twenty beautiful plates, the prothall of 
L. Phlegmaria show points in common with the oophore 
of certain of the Muscinez. 
The sexual organs of Z. Phlegmaria are produced on 
the upper surface of the prothallus, and are always 
accompanied by paraphyses, structures which are absent 
in other Vascular Cryptogams, but frequently present in 
the Muscinez. The position of the antheridia is vari- 
able; sometimes they are scattered singly on the vege- 
tative branches, sometimes they are associated in groups, 
and are then often borne on the considerably thickened 
extremities of branches. Their development is similar to 
those of Z. cernuwm, while the antherozoids have two cilia, 
and resemble those of Se/agine/la. The archegonia have 
a more definite position, and they appear subsequently to 
the antheridia, on those thickened extremities of branches 
which have already borne antheridia: they project from 
the surface of the prothallus, and have three to five canal 
cells, while the highest number hitherto recognised 
