136 
L. Digby 
number is inconstant and appears to vary between one and six, but ap- 
parently seldoni exceeds six. On account of the inconstancy in the 
number of the bodies, and the fact that the entire chromatic contents 
of the nucleus are not concentrated in them, they are believed to be 
merely aggregations of chromatin and not true ‘prochroniosomes’. 
No completely ‘resting’ nuclei were found amongst the archesporial 
tissue, but in those which exhibited the nearest approach to ‘rest’, chro- 
matic bodies were present, and the remainder of the chi'omatin was 
distributed as granules in a definite linin reticulum, giving the nucleus 
a somewhat active appearance. 
2. In the premeiotic resting nuclei the chromatin is for the most 
part concentrated in the deeply staining bodies and in the nucleolus. As 
the nucleus passes into the heterotype prophase the bodies split longi- 
tudinally, their spht sides fragment, become rounded, and enter sy- 
uapsis as large beads. 
3. It is impossible, owing to the complete disorganisation of the 
chromosomes during interldnesis, to trace the homology between the 
Segments of the chromosomes of the telophase of the last premeiotic 
division, and the chromatic bodies of the ensuing rest which precedes the 
meiotic prophase. The fine chromatic precipitate gradually recondenses 
to form chromatic beads, and these concentrate into fewer and fewer 
chromatic bodies as the niore definite resting phase is approached. From 
the sequence of events, and from comparative analogies, it is considered 
that the chromatic bodies represent portions of entire somatic chromo- 
somes, and consequently that the fission which appears in their substance 
and eventually separates each into two daughter halves, is homologous 
with the fission in the substance of the spireme of the somatic prophases, 
and wül eventually cleave the daughter-chromosomes on the homotype 
spindle. 
Similarly the relationship between the chromatic bodies of the resting 
tetrad nucleus and the chromosome segments of the homotype telophase 
could not be ascertained, on account of the fragmentation of the chro- 
mosomes during telophase, and the su])sequent gradual condensation 
of the chromatic contents into definite bodies. 
4. Crepis virens shows two alternative series of presynaptic phases, 
and these may occur in the same inflorescence. In the one series, the 
chromatic contents are aggregated mto definite chromatic bodies, while in 
the other, the chromatin is more finely distributed as smaU beads through- 
out the nuclear reticulum. In the first type the chromatic contents enter 
synapsis as large chromatin beads derived from the spht sides of the 
