362 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [MAY 
bodies extruded from the nucleus. Still others question the 
relationship between plastids and chondriosomes. HARPER (35) 
states as follows: 
None of the evidence so far adduced as to the specific genetic relationship 
between chondriosomes and plant plastids is in any way adequate . 
in certain cells the plastids can be recognized as very small cytoplasmic bodies 
with no starch in them was adequately established by ScuimpER, but that 
the plastid bodies necessarily and regularly arise from the chondriosomes it 
seems to me is by no means proved by such crude and diagrammatic figures and 
seriations as those so far presented. 
Views similar to this have been held by many other workers 
(LUNDEGARDH 46, LOWSCHIN 44, 45, etc.). 
From this brief review it is evident that there are, at present, 
many conflicting views in regard to the class of cell inclusions 
known as chondriosomes, and the relationship which exists between 
plastids in their initial stages and these bodies. It is furthermore 
apparent that this diversity of opinion is in some measure a conse- 
quence of the lack of agreement as to what constitutes permanent 
cytoplasmic organs, and as to what bodies should be included in 
the class “chondriosomes.’’ The problem has been complicated 
further by the fact that certain observers have used a great variety 
of fixatives, which in some cases appear to have preserved the 
bodies in question with relatively little alteration, while in other 
cases artifacts have been produced which have led to various 
misconceptions. 
No reader of chondriosome literature can fail to recognize the 
fact that much of the obscurity which surrounds the subject is 
due to the lack of uniformity in the application by various workers 
of the term chondriosome. By some the term has been applied 
very widely to a considerable variety of minute cell inclusions, 
some of which are seen to develop into plastids. Others are 
inclined to make a distinction between chondriosomes on the one 
hand and the primordia of plastids on the other. Still others 
further restrict the application of the term chondriosome, using 
it only with reference to a concrete class of cell inclusions which 
can be shown to have a particular histochemical constitution. 
Thus Cownry (10) defines chondriosomes primarily as “substances 
which occur in the form of granules, rods, or filaments in almost all 
