—93— 



procedure would scarcely be more absurd than the one 

 advocated in displacing paiipercula with occidentalis. 



Mr. Charles T. Druery is inclined to defend the word 

 seedling as applied to ferns, and writes in reference to the 

 note in the April issue as follows : " Please permit me to 

 point out that the British Fern Culturist is entirely justi- 

 fied in terming the young ferns raised from spores ' seed- 

 lings,' and that it is only the ' merest novice ' among 

 them that is ignorant of the reason. The student of fern 

 biology here is acquainted with the fact that prior to the 

 emergence of the young fern from the prothallium an 

 embedded embryo seed is formed at the base of each 

 archegonium, and that this seed, being subsequently fer- 

 tilized by an antherozoid or pollen-grain equivalent, then 

 acts precisely as ordinary seeds do, by producing roots 

 and fronds, so that the resulting plant is after all a seed- 

 ling. The only case where the term sporeling is alone 

 permissible is where the young fern is asexually, i. c, 

 apogamously, produced by simple budding from the pro- 

 thallium, in which case, of course, the seed is eliminated; 

 but these are the rare exceptions and not the rule. That 

 the word sporeling is avoided is not so much a matter of 

 British conservatism as of British knowledge." So long 

 as there are so many more important conflicts in names 

 to attend to, we shall not quarrel with Mr. Druery over 

 the name he applied to the young fern, but while the sub- 

 ject is up it may not be amiss to point out exactly what 

 takes place in the fern's development from spore to spore. 

 It may be news to many to hear that every fern produces 

 two kinds of spores : one the kind we usually think of 

 when a fresh spore is mentioned and which produces the 

 prothallium ; the other rarely seen, inclosed, as Mr. Dru- 

 ery states, in the archegonium. This cell in the archego- 

 nium, however, does not even become a spore, much less 

 a seed, until another cell called a sperm, produced in the 

 antheridium, has met and fused with it. Until then it is 

 merely an egg-cell incapable of further development. 



