No. 386.] REVIEWS OF RECENT LITERATURE. 169 
homologized with carpellary leaflets, the embryo sac otherwise origi- 
nating in the tissues of the simple carpel), and both subclasses are 
further subdivided according to the number and character of their 
ovule coats, while the ultimate grouping of families, though to a cer- 
tain extent dictated by grosser characters, is influenced largely by the 
results reached in late years by the students of systematic plant 
anatomy. 
_As might be expected, the sequence of families is greatly modified 
from that which represents the conclusions of the English and Ger- 
man schools, though of the two it naturally conforms more closely to 
the latter, by which a more consistent effort has been made to repre- 
sent phylogenetic affinities as indicated by anatomical as well as 
more obvious structure. 
Whatever may be the general verdict on the new basis of primary 
classification and its present exemplification, — and it is likely to find 
more opponents than supporters, — the author is to be congratulated 
on having presented his views in a suggestive and convenient form 
for the guidance of future investigators; and the attempts which are 
sure to be made both to strengthen and overthrow it by the histo- 
logical taxonomists can but result in laying further foundation 
stones for a truly natural system of the flowering plants. r, 
Are Bacteria Fungi? — In Centralblatt f. Bakteriologie, etc., 2te. 
Abt., Bd. iii, Nos. 11 and 12, Dr. Johan-Olsen argues that bacteria 
are simply one stage in the development of fungi and supports his 
text, Zur Pleomorphismusfrage, with two well-drawn plates. Unfor- 
tunately, some of his most striking examples are drawn from species 
of Oospora which mycologists for many years have classed as fungi, 
and whose only claim to be classed as bacteria is the fact that when 
their extremely tenuous hyphe break up into conidia, or oidia, the 
latter closely resemble rod-shaped bacteria in size and form. These 
conidia, however, grow into genuine branched mycelia. Some of the 
other cases which he cites, ¢.g., branched tubercle and diphtheria 
bacilli, may well be involution forms, as Dr. Migula has suggested, 
since they are usually found only in old cultures, sparingly, and under 
conditions unfavorable to the organism. More difficult to explain is 
his account of the change of the mycelium of Dematium casei into 
bacteria bearing endospores, the germination of which spores he suc- 
ceeded in witnessing. Possibly Dr. Ol. Johan-Olsen was working 
with mixed cultures. Much is said of Dr. Brefeld’s System, but if 
Dr. Johan-Olsen’s culture methods are not a very decided improve- 
