372 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [ NOVEMBER 
explicit statement on the part of botanists that they have ever 
observed one in any of the genera just mentioned. 
An exception to the above statement may perhaps be found 
in some remarks in a recent paper by Professor Fr. Schmitz? 
in which he expresses the belief that the hitherto accepted 
accounts of the fertilization in Callithamnion are incorrect. It 
may be gathered from this statement of his opinion that he was 
inclined to believe that ooblastema filaments or their equiy- 
alent exist in Callithamnion, but the brevity of the account 
there given and the absence of figures prevents my comparing 
the complicated condition of things there described with what 
I have observed in Ptilota. 
To bring clearly before the reader the conditions that make 
a satisfactory explanation of the fertilization of the carpogenous 
cell in Ptilota so difficult let us examine some of the figures. 
In the specimen shown in fig. 24 the trichogyne had clearly 
begun to wither; and the carpogenous cell was in process of 
division. Figs. 75, 77, and 2¢ illustrate the one-celled stage of 
the cystocarp, the trichogyne in all instances having withered to 
a certain degree. Figs. 18 and ro show later stages of the 
cystocarp with the withered trichogynes at one side of the pro- 
carps, and in fig. 20 we have a section of an adult cystocafp 
that illustrates very well the relation between the cell of the 
trichophoric apparatus (ta) and the cell of the cystocarp when 
the latter is mature. 
A glance at these figures must make it apparent that the 
trichogyne is so far distant from the carpogenous cell that 
fusion with it would hardly be possible except by means of a? 
ooblastema filament. The writer has never seen anything 
indicate the presence of such a filament, and it does not seem 
him possible that such a structure could be present and escape 
notice in serial sections such as he had to study. There Wa 
° La Nuova Notarisia, W1.—: 114.1892. The first view of Professor Schmitz of 
Untersuchungen iiber die Befruchtung der Florideen 23, 24) was that in the majority ; 
the Ceramiez there is direct fusion between the base of the trichogyne and the oe 
pogenous cell, brought about by the bending of the trichophoric apparatus S0 that 
trichogyne is brought into close proximity to the carpogenous cell. 
