APEX OF THE BOOT IN OS1HJNDA AND TODEA. 101 
significant when considered individually, the Osmundacese 
are distinguished from the mass of the Leptosporangiate Ferns, 
and show themselves to be the nearest of all other groups of 
Ferns to the Marattiaceae. 
DESCRIPTION OF PLATES VIII & IX, 
Illustrating Mr. F. O. Bower’s memoir “ On the Apex of the 
Root in Osmunda and Todea.” 
All the figures, excepting Figs. 9, 10, 15, and the diagrams. Figs. 33 and 
34, were drawn with camera lucida, under objective c, Zeiss, ocular 4 ; but 
the drawings have been reduced by the lithographer to two thirds their original 
size ; the magnifying power is thus two thirds of 325, that is about x 216. 
In all cases the results have been controlled by observation under higher 
powers, viz. Zeiss’s objectives d d, and, when necessary, f. The numbers 
attached to some of the figures show the diameter of the root at the level of 
the initial cells, measured in y^oths of an inch. The apical cell, or initial 
cells, are marked (x). 
Osmunda regalis. — Figs. 1 — 8 and 11 — 22. 
Fig. 1. — Slightly oblique transverse section, showing a three-sided apical 
cell with regular segments. 
Fig. 2. — Four-sided apical cell, as seen in transverse section, with three 
segments. 
Fig. 3. — Four-sided apical cell, with regular segments i — iv; but segment 
v is cut off from the same side as iv. The dotted lines indicate the walls of 
fact that the sporangium is here more deeply seated in its early stages than 
in most other Ferns. That this is an intermediate form between that of the 
truly Leptosporangiate Ferns and that of the Harattiacea is obvious. In 
Angiopteris, Goebel has demonstrated an archespore with a square base (cf. 
‘ Systematik,’ p. 284, fig. 208), and such a form is only to be expected where 
the insertion of the sporangium is proportionately broad and the curvature of 
the outer surface slight. 
Further details, together with figures, will be published later. 
