THALLOGENS. 231 
“The exterior resemblance of these corpuscules to the Anthero- 
zoids of Vaucheria, justifies one in attributing to them analogous 
functions. When these antherozoids become free and diffused 
through the water, they reunite after a time round certain cellules, 
whose contents are organised like spores. They agitate the water 
near these cellules; they attach themselves to its walls, leaving it 
for an instant, then returning immediately. Finally, one of the 
corpuscles, approaching one of the openings existing in the mem- 
brane of the sporanges, it fixes itself there, and introduces its 
delicate beak. Sometimes the posterior part of its body becomes 
too large to pass with impunity; then we see it pushing itself 
on, but without relaxing the hold with its beak, contracting and 
making itself smaller. In short, it forces itself a passage and pene- 
trates into the cavity of the sporange. At the same time other an- 
therozoids penetrate in the same manner or by analogous methods. 
Three or four of these are often engaged at once in the same open- 
ing; the smallest pass without difficulty at the first attempt, and in 
their movement of translation with the liquid in which they swim 
in the bosom of the sporange, describe great circles, and constitute 
an extremely curious phenomenon. After a few moments the 
Sporange may contain more than twenty of these antherozoids, 
Which agitate themselves round the young spores. These are, as 
T have stated above, small soft spheroids, more or less completely 
filled with chlorophyle, and enveloped in a mucous bed, having, 
however, none of the characters of a cellulose membrane. The 
Spermatozoids throw themselves one spore upon another, as if 
omic electric attracted and repulsed them alternately, and that so 
rapidly that the eye can scarely follow their movement. They 
are often observed to move with the same agility from one end 
of the sporange to the other, while the agitation of their vibratile 
cells impresses upon the spores a slow movement of rotation. I have 
Seen the antherozoids agitate themselves confusedly in the cavity 
of the Sporange during more than two hours. Their movement 
omes slower and slower by degrees, and they finish by attaching 
themselves to the surface of the young spores. We can then 
See one or two fix themselves by the cilia and the beak upon 
“ach of these bodies, dwelling as if implanted there, oscillating 
