— 130 — 



lopment of the fruit bodies (fig. 43). At the same time, in ilie same 

 ascogonia, are cells in which the nuclei lie, evidently without any 

 fixed order (fig. 42 and 43). The same disposition of nuclei remains 

 in the perithecia, in which the abovementioned differentiation of 

 the nuclei into larger and smaller ones takes place (fig. 43). 



The study of this question of the pairing of the nuclei made us 

 suppose that the latter are formed here in the same manner as in 

 P. curvula: by dividing. 



Calculating that, on account of the extraordinarily rapid growth 

 of the fungus, all the processes must proceed especially intensely, one 

 hoped to catch these elusive stages of dividing. For this purpose 

 here different means of investigation, were used again, only in a 

 somewhat different direction than for P. curvula. Supposing it pos- 

 sible, that the Flemming fluid is not quite suitable for fixing the 

 figures of dividing of these fungi, other fixers were tried here: 

 Merkel, Juel, Carnoy, Kaiser, v. Rath and boiling alcohol. The 

 results obtained were considerably worse, than at the fixing with 

 ordinary weak Flemming fixer (excepting by v. Rath fixer, the 

 effect of which differs little from that of the Flemming fluid). 



Secondly, the hours of fixing were changed. The fungus was se- 

 veral times fixed, at different hours of the day and night (the other 

 species were, generally, fixed in the day time, about midday). This 

 change of time gave no ^vished results. 



Thirdly, issuing from the supposition that the process of divi- 

 ding proceeds extreemly rapidly, the cultures of Sordaria were fixed 

 eight times during 2 hours and 40 minutes, that is every twenty 

 minutes, but in this case also it was impossible to obtain any stage 

 of di\iding of the nuclei. The results obtained were always the 

 same: in the cells of the ascogoniiim could be observed only the 

 pairing of the nuclei. 



As, by the time of the formation of ascogenous ' hyphae, the 

 nuclei in the ascogonium lie, generally isolated (fig. 44), and in 

 the ascogenous hyphae this connection of the nuclei in pairs is 

 again present, one can here ascertain the same interruption of 

 pairing of the nuclei, as in all the species of Podospora (excepting 

 P. firaiseda, see p. 121). 



One must, doubtless, consider Sordaria, as an object s^ill less 

 convenient for watching the process of dividing, than P. curvula, 



