GERMINATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF EMBRYO OF ZEA MAYS 445 
maturity of the plants developed from embryos without endosperm, to- 
gether with the behavior of their offspring. 
With regard to the anatomy and morphology of the maize seed, the 
writer would like to emphasize the fact that this question is by no means 
a settled one, especially that part of it which concerns the embryo. While 
in the majority of textbooks of botany the scutellum is described as **an 
haustorial suction organ of the embryo," it is not very clear where the scutel- 
lum ends and where the embryo begins; while the cotyledon of monocoty- 
ledonous plants has been reduced to a small region of a cell or cells to be 
seen only in the first stage of embryonic development. 
Sargant and Robertson (10) claim that the scutellum of maize is dis- 
tinguished by the presence of glands on its dorsal face and by the trans- 
fusion tissue conhected with its vascular system. Both of these features 
are undoubtedly connected with its prolonged function as a suction organ. 
Collins (4), after giving some of the opinions of other botanists, suggested 
that the plumule sheath is the coleoptyle, the region beneath the mesocotyl, 
and the part beneath this the radicle. 
Worsdell (15) throws more light on the subject with his conclusions 
that the scutellum is the lamina of the cotyledon corresponding to that of 
the foliage leaf of the grass; the coleoptyle being part of the cotyledon, and 
the mesocotyl the elongated primary node. 
In his experiments the present writer used kernels of Zea indentata, Z. 
indurata, Z. zacharatta, and Z. everta. The kernels were soaked for a few 
hours in warm water, and after removing the testa the scutella with the 
embryos were carefully detached from their endosperms. 
Series of experiments were followed during the years 191 7 and 191 8, 
with embryos and scutella together, and also with embryos detached from 
the scutella. The results are summarized as follows: 
Germination in Different Media of Embryos with Scutella De- 
tached FROM their Endosperms 
To test the vitality of embryos separated from endosperms, they were 
given a few hours, germination on water-soaked filter paper, and those that 
showed a beginning of germination were placed in different solutions in 
individual test tubes to complete the germination. As a check on this ex- 
periment, embryos were germinated also in sterilized sand, using the same 
solutions. The germination media were solutions, alone and in mixture, 
of sucrose, lactose, diastase, and agar, as well as Knop's 0.014 percent nutri- 
ent solution. The germination process was extended from 7 to 12 days at 
temperatures varying from 16° to 22° C. 
The sucrose solutions proved to be the most satisfactory. Concentra- 
tions of I percent and 2 percent of sucrose produced the best germination 
and growth, as the following figures, which represent the average of ten 
plants in each case in a 7-days' germination test, show: 
