1877.] Botany. 43 
_ growing in the same way, both very large trees; but in this case the 
madrofia trunk was perfect, the branches very flourishing, and only here 
and there the remnants of the oak branches projecting, which were 
being rapidly covered, and apparently in a few years there will be no 
external evidence that there was anything but a madrofia, yet it has 
plainly absorbed a large oak tree. Farther on, investigating other ma- 
drofias, I found exactly the same thing, except that the tree absorbed 
was a bay ( Oreodaphne).” — PeLnam W. Ames. 
Tue Sexuat Repropuction or Funer.— That several classes of 
fungi exhibit a sexual as well as a non-sexual mode of reproduction has 
been considered to be established by the researches of De Bary and 
others. In the section of Ascomycetes this was held to be effected by 
the union of the pollinodium or antheridium, as male organ, with the 
ascogonium, resulting in the production of the asci. The most recent 
investigations of Van Tieghem and Cornu throw the gravest doubts on 
this supposed sexual process. They assert that the so-called “ pollinodia ” 
of De Bary are in reality strings of conidia or vegetative cells which 
themselves germinate without any process of impregnation. Van 
Tieghem’s observations were chiefly made on the two Ascomycetous 
genera Chætonium and Sordaria, but apply also to lichens and to the 
alleged conjugation of male and female organs which is stated by some 
writers to take place on the mycelial threads of certain Basidiomycetous 
genera, as Coprinus. ‘The life-history and mode of reproduction of all 
the Fungi seem to be still involved in the greatest obscurity; and all 
the new systems of classification based on these characters must be re- 
garded as provisional only. — A. W. BENNETT. 
Boranicat CLius at Provipence, R. I.— It gives us pleasure to 
announce that a Botanical Section of the Franklin Society has been re- 
cently formed at Providence, and that it has already gone to work with 
a will. Short reports of the meetings have been published in the Prov- 
idence papers, and they indicate a purpose on the part of the society to 
thoroughly explore the remarkable flora of Rhode Island. 
Boranican Papers ın Recent Periopicars.— Flora, No. 28. 
Dr. Müller, New Brazilian Rubiaceæ. Carl Kraus, Mechanics of the 
Growth of Seedling Roots. De Krempelhuber, Brazilian Lichens. No. 
30. J. Wiesner, A New Self-Registering Auxanometer (an instrument 
for measuring rate of growth). No. 31. Westermaier, Cell-Division in 
the Embryo of Capsella Bursa-Pastoris. Drude, On a Mixed Heath- 
and-Meadow Vegetation. 
_ Botanische Zeitung, No. 41. Eriksson, On the Point of Growth 
(punctum vegetationis) in the Roots of Dicotyledons. No. 42. Behrend- 
sen, On the Flora of the Northeast part of Zemplin (Hungary). 
No other foreign journals have at the present date come to hand. 
