48 INTRODUCTION TO CRYPTOGAMIC BOTANY. 



with the suspenders of the embryos in Conifers ; for this pro- 

 cess remains much in the same condition afterwards, while the 

 lower half of the basal cell, which was really and immediately 

 the embryonic cell, at length forms by division a cellular mass, 

 or, in point of fact, a true embryo, with the radicular end pointing 

 one way, and the foliiferous end another. The order of the form- 

 ation of the cells from which the embryo is generated, is exactly 

 contrary to that which takes place in Conifers ; the radicle is 

 not continuous with the suspender, and does not point to the 

 apex of the sac. There is, however, a semblance of two coty- 

 ledons, and besides the fact of numerous cavities existing in 

 the same disc, analogous with albumen, occasionally two* em- 

 bryos are formed in the same cavity. It must not, moreover, 

 be concealed that a bundle of spiral vessels passes from the 

 trunk into each leaf, and that there is a disposition to form 

 adventitious buds in consequence in the axils of the leaves ap- 

 proximating the plant to Phsenogams, insomuch that any frag- 

 ment of the stem will gTOw. In Marsilea the spores resemble 

 still more closely the embryo-sac, for they are ultimately filled 

 with cells. In other cases, the cellular mass resulting from 

 germination loses every resemblance to endosperm, and, in fact, 

 forms the plant, on which fructification is developed by means of 

 archegonia, essentially the same as those of the Club-moss, in the 

 first instance, but very different as to the results. In the Club- 

 moss an embryo is formed which reproduces the species ; in the 

 Moss, a theca is formed which contains spores for the reproduc- 

 tion of the species. The fertile cells in the archegonia, in the two 

 cases, were perfectly homologous, but the productions of those 

 cells, though still homologous, have only remote affinity ; the 

 closer afiinity was shown at an earlier stage of growth. 



35. Wliat, then, is the relation between such Phoenogams as 

 Conifers, and such Cryptogams as Club-mosses ? There is not 

 the slightest transition from the one to the other, though 

 certain resemblances, indeed close analogies, exist, and there 

 is some outward conformity in the results. The ends, how- 

 ever similar, have here been produced by very different 

 means, and the several steps by which the similarity has been 

 produced, arising gradually from the simplest organism, are 



