GERMINATION AND GROWTH. 147 
taining a brownish protoplasm, on which four spicules, bearing 
as many sporules, are generated. 
The germination of the black fruits of Phragmidium only ap- 
pears to take place in the spring. It greatly resembles that in 
Puccinia, except that the filament is shorter, and the sporules 
are spherical and orange-coloured, instead of being kidney- 
shaped and pale. In the species found on the leaves of the 
common bramble, the filament emitted by each cell attains three 
or four times the length of the fruit. The 
granular orange protoplasm which fills it 
passes ere long into the sporules, which 
are engendered at the extremity of pointed 
spicules. After the long warty fruits are 
emptied of their contents they still seem 
as dark as before, but the pores which are 
pierced in the sides, through which the 
germinating filaments have proceeded, are 
more distinctly visible. 
It will be observed that throughout all 
these allied genera of Uromyces, Puccinia, 
Triphragmium, and Phragmidium the same 
type of germination prevails, which confirms 
the accuracy of their classification together, 
and renders still less probable the sup- 
posed affinity of Phragmidium with Spori- 
desmium, which was at one time held by e pula 
: a : Fic. 87. — Germinating 
very astute mycologists, but which is now peeudospore of Phragmi- 
abandoned. This study of germination déiwu dulbosum. (Tulasne.) 
leads also to a very definite conclusion with regard to the genus 
Uromyces—that it is much more closely related to Puccinia and 
its immediate allies than to other unicellular Uredines. 
The germination of the pseudospores of the gelatinous Ure- 
dines of the genus Podisoma was studied by Tulasne.* These 
* Mr. Berkeley has lately published a species under the name of P. Ellistt, 
in which the gelatinous element is scarcely discernible till the plant is moistened. 
There are two septa in this species, and another species or form has lately been 
received from Mr. Ellis which has much shorter pedicels, and resembles more 
