No. 387.] REVIEWS OF RECENT LITERATURE. 271 
snake-plantains of New England; Brainerd, Saniculas of western 
Vermont; Collins, Notes on algæ, 1; Deane, A prolific gentian ; 
Williams, Myosotis collina in New England; Robinson, A new wild 
lettuce (Z. Morssii) from Massachusetts; Webster, Notes on some 
fleshy fungi found near Boston; Manning, Matricaria discoidea in 
eastern Massachusetts. 
The Gametophyte of Botrychium virginianum.!— Until this pub- 
lication of Mr. Jeffrey our knowledge of the development of the 
embryo of Botrychium was practically none, and the previous accounts 
of the prothallus have been very insufficient. The material used in 
his investigation was gathered in its natural habitat — a sphagnum 
bog in which he found an abundance of prothalli in all stages. 
Owing to the extreme delicacy of the objects, great difficulty was 
experienced in mining them into paraffin. An ingenious dialyzer 
rotated by clock-work was employed to insure the more gradual yet 
sufficiently rapid osmosis between the benzole and the alcohol. 
The gametophyte of B. virginianum is subterranean and without 
chlorophyll, and harbors a fungus of a phycomycetous type which 
the author regards as possibly symbiotic with the prothallus. On 
the gametophyte, which is oval in shape and beset with rhizoids, are 
borne both the antheridia and archegonia. The former above the 
latter on the sides. The antheridia, which develop from a single 
superficial cell, possess.a double outer wall like those of other Ophio- 
glossacez known, and the antherozoids are of the usual type of the 
Filicineæ. The archegonium is somewhat less elaborate than that 
of the typical fern, and it is to be noticed that the canal cell while 
binucleate does not show any division of its protoplast. In the 
development of the egg-cell the usual divisions forming the octants 
are seen, but the walls of the latter soon lose their identity and the 
embryo is relatively many-celled before the organs appear. The 
root, shoot, and cotyledon originate from the upper part of the em- 
bryo— z.e., probably the upper octants. The cotyledon is apparently 
a secondary formation in the region of the shoot. The foot which is 
large arises from the whole lower portion of the embryo. The grow- 
ing region of the root, shoot, and cotyledon is in each case a single 
apical cell. The root develops most rapidly at first, followed by the 
cotyledon, a reversal of the condition found in Ophioglossum peduncu- 
1 Jeffrey, E. C. The Gametophyte of Botrychium virginianum, 7yans. Canad. 
Inst. oo Reprinted for University of Toronto Studies (1898), Biol. 
Series, No. 1 
