32. _ . LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
zygote are actually necessary. If we can do without them, 
let us if possible avoid adding to our already grievously 
overloaded dictionary of terms. 
Coming now to the use of the terms gamophyte and 
sporophyte, Professor Parker here catches me at what 
at first sight looks a weak point. He says, ‘‘If the 
terminology in the case in question is to be reformed, 
what we want is names which will apply equally to 
aniinals and plants. From this point of view the termi- 
nation -phyte is obviously inapplicable, as well as the 
whole name sporophyte, since what we wish to express 
is the fact that the asexual generation multiplies by 
budding; the fact of the buds being in some cases uni- 
cellular (spores) and in others multicellular (zooids) is of 
quite secondary importance. I therefore venture to suggest 
blastobiwm for the asexual, and gamobium for the sexual 
generation; the former is equally applicable to a fern- 
plant or a hydroid colony, the latter to a prothallus or a 
medusa.” 
The first criticism I have to make on this suggestion is 
that our difficulties will be greatly increased if changes of 
a serious nature have to be made in zoological as well as 
in botanical nomenclature. My most serious criticism 
is, however, that plant spores are not buds in the sense 
in which a medusa may be so termed. Spores arise by 
division of the nucleus and protoplasm of a pre-existing 
cell. I am of course open to correction from the zoologist, 
but at present I fail to see that alternation of sexual and 
asexual stages in a plant’s life-history is homologous with 
the at first sight similar phenomenon exhibited by some of 
the Hydrozoa (we are not considering of course hetero- 
gamy). Indeed I believe that ‘‘alternation of generations” 
in the animal world is spoken of now more correctly as 
metagenesis (a term Professor Parker himself uses), that 
