1918] NOTHNAGEL—FERTILIZATION 155 
that the group on the right side of the equatorial plate might be 
the group that has been pulled into line. Soon after this each 
chromosome splits longitudinally, as FERGUSON (4, 5) has reported 
for Pinus, and all trace of the individuality of the groups is lost for 
a time. 
It has been generally understood that in Lilium Martagon fusion 
and subsequent divisions did not occur unless the top was cut off 
from the bulb; but in the plants used in this investigation, in 
which this was not done, the ovaries showed many dividing endo- 
sperm nuclei and the sacs were in good condition (fig. 29). In 
Trillium grandiflorum in a sac of four dividing endosperm nuclei 
(fig. 28), and in Lilium Martagon in a sac of two dividing nuclei 
(fig. 29), as described previously, three groups of chromosomes 
are seen on the spindle. This corresponds to the condition of the 
second division of the oosphere, as FERGUSON (4, 5) has reported 
for Pinus, in which she notes that the second division is like the 
first, there being two spirems. 
Figs. 28 and 29 distinctly show the three groups, and if such a 
condition is normal the question arises whether the male and female 
chromatin remaining distinct is the cause of the mottled appear- 
ance of some hybrid endosperms as found in Zea Mays. As has 
been observed by many investigators upon chromosome count in 
endosperm when it consists of many nuclei, the number varies in 
the different nuclei, there no longer being the 3x number. If in 
some of the divisions, when there is not an equal distribution of 
chromosomes, which is common in endosperm divisions, one group 
should pass to one pole and two to the other, the chromatin 
brought in by the sperm would then be in one nucleus by itself, or 
with one of the polar nuclei, thus causing the mottled appear- 
ance in the endosperm as seen in Zea Mays. 
The earlier writers on double fertilization, STRASBURGER (17, 
18), Morrrer (14), NAWASCHIN (15), and Ernst (3), and the 
latest investigator Sax (16), concluded that there was an inter- 
mingling or a complete fusion of the chromatin contributed by 
the sperm and two polar nuclei in the formation of the primary 
endosperm nucleus, and Ernst (3) further stated that he was 
unable to recognize at segmentation or in spirem the chromatin 
