152 THE BOTANICAL 31 AG AZINE. [Voi.xxm. n 0.2:1. 



bore many sporelings in their reproductive branches. It may 

 be remarked here in passing that the eggs of Sargassum, as 

 already known, on leaving the conceptacle become fastened to 

 the receptacle by mucilagenous substance, and before the depart- 

 ure from the parent stock which will take place after a few 

 days, the segmentation proceeds to some extent. 



At first sight I noticed that the sporelings attached were 

 not distributed through the whole length of receptacle, but 

 were confined to the lower or middle portion of it ; in the 

 latter case the lower, portion of the receptacle was entirely free 

 from oospheres. One might consider as follows : the liberation 

 of oospheres would have begun at the very base of receptacle 

 and proceeded gradually towards the apex. But the closer 

 examination of sporelings proved that it was not the case, be- 

 cause the segmentation of the sporelings in one receptacle was 

 nearly in the same stage, that is the sporelings near the base 

 were not segmented any farther than those towards the apex. 

 This facts reminded me of the periodical liberation of the sexual 

 elements in Dictyota dichotoma and induced me to devote my- 

 self to the farther investigation. 



Before long, on the 24th. of December, the next day after 

 full moon, I was lucky to observe that almost all individuals 

 of this alga on the coast discharged their oospheres simultane- 

 ously. The discharged oospheres stayed on the receptacle till 

 27th. and dropped off also simultaneously, and on the 28th. 

 there was no more a single stock that bore the sporelings in 

 the receptacle. After a fortnight, on the 6th. of January, the 

 day of new moon, the next general liberation of oospheres oc- 

 curred in such a vivid way as before. The receptacles which 

 discharged their oospheres on the 24th., repeated the same 

 thing this time. Of course there were also many receptacles 

 whose oospheres were liberated for the first time. 



As I had to leave the station on the next day I cannot re- 

 port how the plant went on thereafter. Althongh the above 

 description is concerned to only one species, Sargassum enerve, 

 I am convinced that the similar phenomenon will be common 

 to all members of the genus ; actually I observed on the 26th. 



