e 
446 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [JUNE 
always be formed from several minor poles which extend in 
every direction, without the control of some body or other 
influence at a definite point. The writer has preparations in 
which very definite centrospheres are to be seen at the poles of 
the mother star. These preparations have been examined by a 
large number of experienced observers at more than one labora- 
tory, so that the sweeping assertion that no such bodies have 
ever been observed in the higher plants is certainly unwarranted. 
In this connection it might also be proper to speak of the 
large spherical bodies figured by Farmer” on his multipolar spin- 
dles in the pollen mother cells of Lilium Martagon. There is no 
doubt in my mind, from the description and figures, that these 
were micronucleoli, and had nothing whatsoever to do with the 
spindle, especially as he speaks of granules which are colored by 
those stains which differentiate the chromatic elements of the 
nucleus. 
It must be remembered that it is an impossibility to find 
the spindle converging to a single pole when the nucleus and 
spindle have been cut into half a dozen slices, and more often cut 
diagonally than longitudinally. No one denies that multipolar 
spindles are to be seen in such cases. But it will be remembered 
that most of these so-called multipolar spindles have been 
reported in just such cases, nearly always in connection with the 
enormous nuclei of the pollen mother cell or the reduction 
nucleus of the embryo sac. The cell and its contents would 
have to be made of steel or flint if it were to preserve its cen- 
trospheres and poles in proper position after having been cut 
into half a dozen or more sections. It is even claimed that in 
the thinnest sections it is easily seen that the spindle does not 
come to a pole, which is certainly not surprising. 
The numerous radiations which appear around the daughter 
nuclei, if the suggestion is correct for those around the mother 
nucleus, are for the purpose of returning the micronucleoli into 
the daughter nuclei. As has been said, the micronucleoli are 
6 On ve divi “ ee E 11 th “eit of Lilium Martagon. Ann. Bot. 
7+ 392-396. 1893. oe 
