1905] COULTER & LAND—TORREYA TAXIFOLIA 167 
integuments represents only one-twentieth of the entire length of the 
seed. -The characteristic structures of the integuments are con- 
tinued as two distinct peripheral layers of this large mass of additional 
tissue, and the tissue within these layers may be taken to represent 
in a similar way the downward extension of the nucellus. It is this 
additional nucellar tissue that the endosperm chiefly invades, giving 
rise to the phenomenon of “rumination,” to be described later. 
OLIVER (7) has also described fully the course of the vascular strands 
in the ovule of certain species of Torreya, a description which seems 
to serve as well for T. taxijolia. 
FEMALE GAMETOPHYTE.—The mother-cell is solitary and with 
no differentiation of a nutritive mechanism about it, such as appears 
in connection with the “spongy tissue” of Pinus, and in all the 
Pinaceae investigated. In Torreya it is directly in contact with the 
cells that are resorbed, without any intervening digestive layer (jig. 
20). Since this is true also of Podocarpus (2) and Taxus (10), it 
suggests the possibility that Taxaceae in general may be character- 
ized by the absence of a special digestive layer about the mother-cell. 
The reduction division was not seen, but a more or less complete 
tetrad is formed, as observed by Miss RoBERTSON (8) also in T. 
californica. 
The germination of the megaspore begins ick the usual free 
nuclear division, the nuclei being in the parictal position when only 
sixteen to thirty-two in number (figs. 14 and 15). The interior of 
the sac contains cytoplasmic material, much less dense than the 
cytoplasm of the parietal layer, and also some reserve food. In this 
early few-nucleate stage of the endosperm there is always an appear- 
ance suggesting that the sac has sent a beak-like projection, contain- 
ing a nucleus, upwards into the nucellar tissue (fig. 15). After a 
careful comparison of the position of this apparent projection in 
reference to the surrounding parts with that of the megaspore, it 
seems that the “projection” is the original site of the megaspore, 
and that the appearance of a projection is due to the fact that the sac 
has encroached almost exclusively upon the chalazal tissue. This 
conspicuous beak, containing one of the parietal nuclei, often appears 
close to the tip of an advancing pollen tube, and suggests a possible 
explanation of the peculiar behavior ascribed to the archegonium 
