of Edinhurgh, Session 1883-84. 
383 
to believe that the supposed absence of annulus was the result of an 
oversight, so distinctly developed is it in my specimens ; not to 
speak of its universal occurrence in the adult Nepenthes plant. 
Eegarding the anatomical structure of these pitchers, there are 
several interesting points to note. 
A. The Pitcher-lid . — This exhibits ciliary processes each tipped 
with a cell-group resembling that of a glandular hair. These pro- 
cesses, however, seem to be somewhat more than mere epidermal ap- 
pendages, at least containing ground-tissue, as evidenced by the 
occurrence of the curious spiral cells which are developed so exten- 
sively in the ground tissue of these plants ; and possibly they may 
represent prolongations of the entire leaf substance, like the tentacles 
of Drosera. Furthermore, there is no trace of the honey-glands 
which are to be seen on the lid of the adult form in both its parents ; 
and in connection with this, it is interesting to note the absence of 
lid -glands in the adult of N. ampidlaria, which species may thus be 
considered as exhibiting the undifferentiated or embryonic character. 
B. The Annidus . — This is quite distinctly marked, and may be 
traced by its characteristically imbricate epidermis from just above 
the transverse membrane joining the wings up to the pitcher-orifice, 
where it is inflected as a slightly crenated margin. The most inter- 
esting feature of the annidus., however, is the presence, just within 
the inflexed margin, of small cushion- or button-like glands, resem- 
bling in general character the glands of the secreting surface in the 
lower part of the pitcher-cavity. In the first leaf and those imme- 
diately succeeding it, these glands are usually three in number (in 
one specimen I have seen only two). In the subsequently developed 
leaves they become more numerous, and in our seedlings now about 
a year old, as many as twenty of these glands may be counted along 
the margin of a pitcher about an inch long. They form a very 
pretty circlet — or rather semi-circlet — reminding one of the row of 
ocelli in an Actinia. The presence of these glands in the annulus, 
coupled with the absence of lid-glands, at once arrested my atten- 
tion, and led me to suppose that here we probably had structures of 
greater morphological significance and of more universal occurrence 
than the glands of the lid, since these glands — physiologically im- 
portant as they undoubtedly are — are not necessarily present in the 
adult plant. I have accordingly examined the annulus of a number 
