Notes. 
326 
In the genus Cystopus fertilization is effected in C. candidus by the fusion of 
two nuclei, whereas in an allied species, C. bliti , about one hundred nuclei fuse in 
pairs to effect the same object. 
Finally, in the Uredineae binucieate cells are usual during one phase of the 
life-cycle, but in Entyloma gland, one of an allied group, the cells during this same 
phase are multinucleate. 
The above examples illustrate only some of the variants as to number of 
nuclei in the cells of closely allied species, after which much faith is necessary to 
admit the value of the number of nuclei present in cells as indicating phylogenetic 
affinities. 
Returning to the conidial form of Hypomyces pernidosum , where the binucieate 
cells are reproduced by conjugate division, or, in other words, where the two nuclei 
in a cell divide simultaneously, viewed from Dangeard’s standpoint the fusing 
of the two nuclei in the conidium is a sexual act, and the conidium becomes an 
oogonium ; hence what is considered by common consent to be an asexual conidial 
form is, according to Dangeard, the sexual form, and the ascophore stage emanating 
from the germinating conidium and having uninucleate cells, which is considered 
as representing the sexual phase, becomes according to Dangeard a conidial or 
asexual phase. 
GEO. MASSEE. 
Jodrell Laboratory, Kew. 
ON SOME NEW SPECIES OF LAGENOSTOMA 1 : A TYPE OF PTERIDO- 
SPERMOUS SEED FROM THE COAL MEASURES (ABSTRACT). — The recent 
discoveries of the seeds of two genera of the Cycadofilices, Lyginodendron and Medul- 
losa, mark an important epoch in the history of our knowledge of Palaeozoic plants. As 
a corollary of this work, attention has been called afresh to the impressions or casts of 
seed-like bodies which occur, here and there, in the sandstones and shales of the Coal 
Measures, with the result that two new species, described here, have been identified 
as members of the genus Lagenostoma. Although the anatomical structure is not 
preserved in either case, these seeds in their external morphology agree so closely 
with the three species of Lagenostoma previously recorded from petrified material 
that there can be no hesitation in referring them to the same genus. In view of the 
recent attribution of the seed Lagenostoma Lomaxi to Lyginodendron by Professor 
Oliver and Dr. Scott, it is highly probable that these new species belonged either to 
that genus or to some closely related member of the Lyginodendreae. These 
specimens also throw light on the habit of these plants, especially with regard to the 
manner in which the female organs were borne, a character which is, with rare 
exceptions, extremely difficult to ascertain in the case of fossil plants owing to the 
fragmentary nature of the evidence. 
1 Abstract of a paper read before the Royal Society on February 23, 1905. 
