SEXUAL EEPKODUCTION. 173 



One of the warts, larger than the rest, and recognizable by its 

 cylindrical form, always forms a kind of thick sheath around 

 the fecundating tube. The ripe endospore is a thick, smooth, 

 colourless membrane, composed of cellulose containing a bed of 

 finely granulated protoplasm, which surrounds a great central 

 vacuole. This oospore, or resting spore, may remain dormant 

 in this state within the tissues of the foster plant for some 

 months. Its ultimate development by production of zoospores 

 is similar to the prod action of zoospores from conidia, which 

 it is unnecessary to. repeat here. The oospore becomes an 

 oosporangium, and from it at least a hundred germinating 

 bodies are at length expelled. 



Amongst the principal observers of certain phenomena of copu- 

 lation in cells formed in the earliest stages of the JDiscomycetes 

 are Professor de Bary,* Dr. Woronin, -j- and Messrs. Tulasrie.J 

 In the Ascobolus pulcherrimus of Crouan, Woronin ascertained 

 that the cup derives its origin from a short and flexible tube, 

 thicker than the other branches of the mycelium, and which is 

 soon divided by transverse septa into a series of cells, the succes- 

 sive increase of which finally gives to the whole a torulose and 

 unequal appearance. The body thus formed he calls a " vermi- 

 form body." The same observer also seems to have convinced 

 himself that there exists always in proximity to this body certain 

 filaments, the short arched or inflected branches of which, like 

 so many antheridia, rest their anterior extremities on the utri- 

 form cells. This contact seems to communicate to the vermifoi'm 

 body a special vital energy, which is immediately directed towards 

 the production of a somewhat filamentous tissue, on which the 

 hymenium is at a later period developed. This " vermiform 

 body " of M. Woronin has since come to be recognized under 

 the name of " scolecite." 



Tulasne observes that this " scolecite " or ringed body can be 

 readily isolated in Ascobolus furfuraceus. When the young re- 



* De Bary, in "Annales des Sciences Naturelles" (5 me ser.), p. 343. 

 + Woronin, in De Bary's "Beitr. zur. Morph. und Physiol, der Pilze," ii. 

 (1866), pp. 1-11. 

 X Tulasne, "Ann. des Sci. Nat." (5 mB ser.), October, 1866, p. 211. 



