102 
L. Digby 
1 « 
Davis (5, 6 and 7) has devoted considerable attention to the subject 
of chroinatic bodies in a series of papers on tlie Oenotheras. These bodies 
are present in the somatic and prenieiotic resting nuclei of 0 . grandiflora 
(5) and 0. Uennis (6). They sometimes niunber more, and sometimes 
less, than the chroniosonies. Subsequently in 0. Lamarcldana (7), he was 
able to trace the identity of the chroniosonies of the telophase of the 
last archesporial divisions with the deeply staining bodies of the pre- 
nieiotic resting nuclei. “These are the chroinatic bodies described by 
the author for Uennis and grandiflora, and there can be no doubt that 
they are derived from the chroniosonies of the preceding niitosis; they 
apparently correspond to the prochroniosomes of Overton, Rosen- 
berg, and others” (p. 944). They are however distributed iivegularly 
throughout the nucleus, and exhibit no evidence of a paired arrangement, 
but their position with regard to one another suggests rather that of 
an eiid-to-end relationship on the linin Strands. 
Tahara (58) foimd no definite chroinatic aggregations in the young 
poUen niother-nuclei of Morus, but “kurz vor dem Eintreten zur Synapsis 
kommen die jetzt immer mehr wachsenden Prochromosomen welche sich 
schon paarweise anordnen, zum Vorschein” (p. 283). He was not able 
to obtain defmite counts. 
Nakao (37) has described a similar case to that of Morus in the cereals 
Hordeum distichon, Trüicum vulgare and Secale eereale. The resting 
vegetative and premeiotic nuclei show no definite structure, but gradually 
chroinatic bodies appear, whose number increases until it attains to ap- 
proxünately that of the chromosomes. These are the so-called prochronio- 
somes. As the reticulum jtasses into sjmapsis, the chroinatic bodies 
“are fmely divided and more or less evenly distributed in the linin ground, 
forniing nuclear threads” (p. 176). In sonie of the Primulas (10) pre- 
nieiotic restmg nuclei are Ukevise somewhat devoid of chroinatic con- 
tents, but, with the approach of prophase, chroniatic bodies gradually 
make their appearance. These origmate as droplets from the nucleus, 
which detach theniselves and gradually beconie chroniatic. 
Frisendahl (15) has described small ‘Körnchenpaare’ in the resting 
nuclei of Myricaria germanica and has shown that two of these pairs 
represent a chroniosome. He has traced their honiology with the chromo- 
sonies of the telophase of the preceding niitosis, in which each chroniosome 
not only splits longitudinaUy, but also breaks apart traiisversely, either 
once, or occasionally more often. “Ein Chromosom wird also jetzt 
durch zwei Paare von Chroniatinkörnern, die durch parallele Linien- 
fäden verbunden sind, repräsentiert” (p. 6). The pairs of ‘Chroniatm- 
