CHAPTER IX. 



OPHIOGLOSSEiE. 



The germination and development of Botrychiiim Lunaria Sw. 



The Moonwort germinates underground. Germ-plants*' 

 are sometimes found in the neighbourhood of full-grown 

 individuals in places where the plant is common. They 

 are not unlike torn fragments of branched roots of the 

 plant itself (PL XLII, figs. 2 — 5), but upon careful exami- 

 nation they are found to be organically closed at all ends. 

 At the point of junction of the roots, a prominent knob 

 is found (PI. XLII, figs. 4, 5). A microscopical analysis 

 of the latter leads to the discovery of a bud buried in 

 a deep, almost closed depression. In September, 1854, 

 Irmisch and I discovered at a depth of from one to three 

 inches under the surface of the earth, not only a series 

 of productions undoubtedly transitional between germ- 

 plants and full-grown Botrychia, but also germ-plants, to 

 which the prothallium was still attached. The prothallium 

 of Botrychium (PI. XLI, fig. 5), is an oval mass of firm 

 cellular tissue, whose larger diameter does not exceed half 

 a line, and is often less., It is light brown on the outside, 

 yellowish-white on the inside, and furnished on all sides 

 with scattered, rather long, capillary roots. The cells, 

 whose size diminishes from the middle of the prothallium 

 towards the periphery, are filled with large and small lumps 



* The germ-plants upon which these observations were made came from the 

 neighbourhood of Sondershausen. I am indebted to my friend Professor 

 Irmisch for them. 



