37° BOLTANICAL GAZETTE [ JUNE 
anilin-safranin and picro-nigrosin. The sections were mostly 
cut 10, 12, and 18, and stained on the slide. 
GENERAL CHARACTERS 

The deeply buried bulbs begin to develop the incept of the 
flower early in the summer. By the first of September the 
incipient flower bud is considerably advanced, and the carpels 
are developing the ovules. Usually before the first of October 
the single hypodermal archesporial cell can be distinguished, 
and the integuments are just beginning to make their appear- 
ance. The anther wall shows five layers and the pollen mother 
cells are enlarging. By December first the tetrads are formed, 
but separation of the four microspores may be delayed for some 
time later in certain flowers. The cells of the anther are filled 
with starch grains and the tapetum is still active, some of its 
nuclei being in stages of direct division. At this time there is 
no sign of the division of the nucleus of the microspore, but the 
exine of the wall is developing. The nucleus divides some time 
between December 1 and April 1, but the time was not ascer- 
tained. In the meantime, the archesporial cell in the ovule has. 
been increasing in size and activity, and has formed the continu- 
ous spirem from the chromatin network. In this condition it 
passes the winter. The cell in which the reduction takes place, 
therefore, has a period of development extending over SiX 
months. In some years it cannot be much less than eight 
months. It will also be observed that while the reduction divis- 
ion in the anther takes place in the fall, in the ovule it is delayed 
until early spring. 
The flowers are growing rapidly long before the frost is 
entirely out of the ground, and during this time the divisions in 
_the embryo sac occur, so that when the flowers come out of, the 
ground the divisions are usually completed. 
Very few flowers appear to develop ovules of any size, and 
ripe seed is very scarce. In fact I have seen very little during 
the past three years. Propagation is effected largely by means 
_of the multiplication of the bulbs. About the first of June, at 

haber “gr ay 


