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1900 | CURRENT LITERATURE 293 
closes an electric circuit through one or the other of the electromagnets, 
ne electromagnet, actuating one of the pulleys over which the belt passes, 
raises the writing point, while the other lowers it, thus recording a corre- 
sponding deflection of the organ. In the instrument used by Baranetzky a 
deflection of 1° was recorded by a 2™™" step in the record line. He thinks 
the instrument capable of twice as great sensitiveness.— C. R. B 
HOFMEISTER in his description of the Balanophoracee, which reap- 
pears in the text-books,"™ describes the pistil as a carpel containing a single 
integumented ovule, attached. laterally near the top; fertilization attends the 
introduction of a pollen tube; a five to eight-celled embryo develops and is 
attached to the wall of the sac by a suspensor. After a cursory examination 
of Balanophora Indica, using material secured from India, van Tieghem™ 
declares that there is no ovule or placenta; that the megaspore is plunged 
into the tissue at the base of the style ; that there is no fusion of polar nuclei, 
and that fertilization occurs rather indifferently at either the sexual or the 
antipodal end of the sac. Treub*3 has now published a very close series of 
figures from earliest stages to mature fruit, drawn from sections of 2. elongata 
which occurs abundantly in the neighborhood of the Buitenzorg Gardens in 
Java. Treub finds no ovule or placenta; there is an epidermal growth above 
the embryo-sac designated as the style ; the polar nuclei do not fuse and the 
development of the endosperm invariably results from growth and division of 
the polar cell of the egg apparatus. Periclinal walls cut off a cell in the 
midst of the endosperm which develops into a five to ten-celled pseudo- 
embryo. Treub decides against fertilization, but in a species in which 
Staminate flowers occur. Dr. Lotsy,'* however, confirms him in every particu- 
lar, including non-fertilization, from observations upon B. globosa, a species 
which, in his neighborhood at least, has no staminate flowers. He objects to 
using the word « style” at all in comparing this curious organ with the floral 
Structures of other plants. For hints with regard to the course of reduction 
and its point of departure both Treub and Lotsy look forward to the study of 
Rhopalocnemis Phalloides Jungh. and other forms. Dr. Lotsy is very anxious 
that Balanophora Indica be worked over again with much care, and perhaps 
with special reference to cytological problems.—J. E. WEBB. 
“ENGLER and PRANTL: Natiirlichen Pflanzenfamilien III. 12261. SCHENK : 
Handbuch 3" : 369 
@ VAN ausg Pu.: Sur organisation florale des Balanophoracées. Bull. Bot. 
Soc. de France 43: 
*STREUB, ak L’organe femelle et l’apogamie du Balanophora elongata, 
Bl. Ann. Jard. Buitenz. 15: 1-22, pl. 7 
“ Lotsy, Dr. J.P: Balanophora pre Jungh. Ann. Jard. Buitenz. IL. 1: 174-186, 
Al. 26-29. 1899, 
