472 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [JUNE 
tion 13 months after pollination. The numerous archegonia are scattered 
over the broader micropylar portion of the gametophyte. The pollen grains 
germinate in the axils of the cone scales, before there is any differentiation of 
amicropyle. The pollen tubes are long and branching and penetrate the cone 
axis, and also the phloem and even the xylem of the scale traces. The two 
sperms are somewhat unequal cells with delicate walls, and their nuclei are 
as large as the egg nucleus. The proembryo is three-tiered, the uppermost tier 
forming the suspensor, the middle tier the embryo, and the lowest tier a pro- 
tective cap. The cone scale is said to be structurally double, representing a 
combination of the bract and scale in Abietineae. It is concluded that the 
araucarians represent a highly specialized branch of the Coniferales, and that 
Araucaria is probably more ancient than A gathis.—J. M. C. 
Anatomy of Botrychioxylon.—Scorr® has described in detail the anatomy 
of Botrychioxylon, one of the paleozoic Zygopterideae. As in all the members 
of this family, a true pith is absent, the primary wood of the stele being 
intermixed with much parenchyma. Around the whole primary cylinder, as 
well as around the diarch leaf-trace, is a wide zone of secondary wood, a condition 
rare or absent in most of the family. The petiolar bundle resembles somewhat 
that of Dineuron or Metaclepsydropsis. Because of the unusual development 
of secondary wood, Botrychioxylon is considered by its author to approach the 
living Botrychium more closely than has any previously described form, and to 
present evidence for the affinity of the Zygopterideae and Ophioglossaceae. 
This conclusion is in harmony with that general theory, now the subject of 
much dispute, which derives the true pith of modern ferns from tissue which 
was primitively stelar—E. W. Srnnorr. 
Fertilization in Gagea.—In Gagea lutea® the usual double fertilization is 
the rule, but occasionally both male nuclei fuse with the egg. Another appar- 
ently unusual feature is the inclusion of cytoplasm between the fusing nuclei 
both during the fertilization of the egg and during the fusion of the polar nuclei. 
The included cytoplasm soon disorganizes. This is the second record of such 
a cytoplasmic inclusion, the first having been made by BRown? in his study 
of Peperomia. The dispermic fertilization and a study of the literature of 
chromosome numbers leads NEMec into speculations upon the origin of muta- 
tion.—CHARLES J. CHAMBERLAIN. 
* Scott, D. H., On Botrychioxylon paradoxum, sp. nov., a paleozoic fern with 
secondary ene Trans. Linn. Soc. Bot. 72373-3890. pis. ar. 1912. 
29 NEME , Uber Befruchtung bei Gagea. Bull. Internat. Acad. Sci. 
Bohéme ne ae. Jigs. 
3° Brown, W. H., oy dened of material between nucleus and cytoplasm in 
Peperomia sintenisii. Bot. Gaz. 49:189-194. pl. 13. 1910. 
