1 9 Hi MCCORMICK— SYMPHYOGYNA ASP ERA 413 



of sporophytes of liverworts belonging to the Marchantiales, 

 Jungermanniales, and Anthocerotales, in the stages preceding the 

 maturity of the spore mother cell, show the same situatio 

 slides are the accumulation of vears and have been 



These 



made 



different people. On account of the lobing of the mother cell, the 

 Jungermanniales show the irregularity to a more marked degree and 



time 



similar 



may be seen. From the observations made, it may 

 le interpretation that during the development of the 1 



* 



mother 



assume amoeboid forms 



Older 



stages of the sporophyte (figs. 42-44) show increase in the accumula- 



muc 



cell walls into a substance of that nature. Hofmeister (20, p. 81) 

 notes that the walls become considerably thicker, and that the 

 substance of these walls is converted into a substance which swells 

 extensively in water. There are striations which readily could be 

 mistaken for walls, but any mucilaginous substance may give that 

 effect. 



Development of the spore mother cells in an individual sporo- 

 phyte is not simultaneous, as may be seen in fig. 44, which shows 

 the beginning of the lobing of one mother cell and other sporoge- 

 nous cells still dividing. As the mother cell begins to become 

 lobed, the extensions of the protoplast become more marked and 

 vacuoles seem to play an important part in the process of lobing. 

 A characteristic stage (fig. 45) shows the orientation of the four 

 lobes and in each lobe there is a large vacuole. Later (figs. 46 and 

 47) the large vacuoles are broken up into smaller ones and the cyto- 

 plasm is uniformly distributed throughout each lobe. Apparently 

 the nucleus always occupies the central position of the mother cell. 



Davis (8), in discussing the spore mother cell of Anthoceros, 

 asks the question whether the cytoplasm could be intrusted with so 

 important a task as the preparation of a chloroplast for each of the 

 four nuclei. A similar question may be asked in regard to the 

 lobing of the mother cells. In the lobing of the mother cells it seems 

 as if there are two alternatives: either the nucleus, long before it 



