CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE WISLEY LABORATORY. 369 



bodies, each with a single cihum. The thin-walled sporangia contain 

 few or no free, separate oil drops, and in this respect differ from the 

 thick- walled cysts. The swarmers are smaller in size than those in 

 the sporocysts and usually have a large oil drop within them. He 

 gives a figure (t. 1, f. 7) of the. contents squeezed from a fresh 

 sporocyst wherein zoospores and ' * oil and fat globules ' ' are repre- 

 sented. In studying this figure there are appearances which seem to 

 me to convey a false impression of the nature of the globules. The 

 form is always rounded, not angular, and not like three angular frag- 

 ments (?) shown. 



The globular bodies which I have observed in large numbers 

 in thin-walled sporangia of Chrysophlyctis are identical in appear- 

 ance with those already described* as occurring under certain 

 circumstances in the cells of potato (not affected with Chrysophlyctis) 

 and bracken. Nothing definite is yet known with regard to their 

 chemical composition and function. The point that needs to be made 

 perfectly plain is that these bodies appear in preparations fixed with 

 Flemming, and readily take certain stains (using Heidenhaim or the 

 Triple stain). The reproduction of the microphotographs (figs. 105, 106) 

 represents a potato cell, after fixation in Flemming 's weak solution, 

 containing a number of these minute globular bodies. It should be 

 possible, therefore, to trace their development during a cytological 

 study. This, however, has not yet been done, so that the cytological 

 investigation of Chrysophlyctis is not yet comjDlete. Geiggs t has 

 observed in a series of fixed and stained sections of Synchytrium a 

 phenomenon which he describes as " nuclear gemmation." The bodies 

 (''nuclei") he figures parallel to a remarkable extent the above- 

 mentioned globular bodies. 



Pekgival's statement that the structure and division of the primary 

 nucleus and the formation of secondary nuclei are in close agreement 

 with the researches of several investigators upon various species of 

 Synchytnuia does not aid in establishing actual identity with this 

 genus. Cytological characters of this kind might obtain throughout a 

 group of allied genera. 



From the above-mentioned considerations, the transference of 

 Chrysophlyctis to the genus Synchytrium, in the present state of our 

 knowledge, cannot be maintained. 



In Kryptogame7iflora der Mark Brandenburg, Chrysophlyctis is 

 placed among the Olpidiaceae near Sphaerita, Asterocystis and 

 Olpidiuin. This systematic placing is perhaps premature. From 

 what is at present known regarding these genera, Chrysophlyctis 

 seems to possess fewer characters in common with Olpidium than with 

 the Synchytriaceae and Woroninaceae, the remaining families of the 

 Myxochytridineae. The matter cannot be settled satisfactorily, how- 

 ever, until the life-histories of these obscure organisms have been more 

 searchingly investigated. 



* A. S. HoRNE, Centralhlatt fur Bakt. ii., Bd. 28 (1910), p. 403. 

 t Griggs, Botanical Gazette, xlvii. (1909), pp. 127-138, pi. 3 and 4. 

 VOL. XXXVII. B B 



