162 : BOTANICAL GAZETTE [MARCH 
such forms as the beech-maple-hemlock forms of our northern woods, our most 
mesophytic type of association. Probably it never becomes a large tree, although 
farmers always cut the trees as soon as they become at all usable. Rarely were 
any found over 30°™ in diameter or more than 9 to 12™ high. It has remark- 
able capacity for vegetative reproduction, almost equaling the redwood in this 
respect. Many suckers issue from cut stumps, and even from fallen trunks; 
even rotten stumps show vigorous suckers, and it seems to be as tenacious of life 
as the poplar. Staminate trees appear to be the more numerous; however, 
when in blossom they are far more conspicuous than are the pistillate trees, and 
the conclusion as to proportion may not hold. 
Cow Les secured collections of staminate and ovulate material 
April 4 and 5, and arranged for subsequent collections to be sent to 
the laboratory. These collections were made at intervals of approxi- 
mately’ two weeks up to October 21. The strobilus-bearing twigs 
were packed in damp cotton in tightly closed tin buckets and reached 
the laboratory in good condition in about five days. The length of 
the intervals between collections and between collecting and killing 
has prevented so close a series as is desirable at certain stages, but 
the gymnosperm periods are so long that a fair outline of morpho- 
logical events was secured. 
SPERMATOGENESIS. 
Srropii.—The staminate strobili occur in the axils of leaves of 
young shoots. Their appearance in October, on a shoot of the 
same season, is shown in fig. r. At this time they are small and 
ovoid, solitary in the axil of each leaf, and by a curving of the short 
peduncles are displayed along the under surface of the shoot. The 
strobilus consists of a series of closely overlapping sterile bracts, 2 
four vertical rows, completely enveloping the tip of the axis bearing 
numerous stamens. It is thus distinctly sterile below and fertile 
above, the sporophylls continuing the spiral succession developed 
by the bracts (figs. 6 and 7). 
The young strobili were first observed in July, and at that time 
no primordia of sporophylls were evident; but in August these wer’ 
beginning to appear. Fig. 7 is from a longitudinal section throug 
a strobilus at this period (August 12), showing the overlapping sterile 
bracts and the beginning of stamineal primordia. A remarkable 
development of the pith region of the axis below the staminate Por 
