Thoday. — On the Inflorescence Axis in Gudilin. 621 
NOTE ON THE INFLORESCENCE AXIS IN GNETUM.— Professor 
Pearson’s investigation of the male inflorescence has made it advisable to add 
some comment to the short description of the male axis in G. scandens made on 
p. 1106 of my recent paper (Annals, 19 n), and Professor Pearson has kindly 
allowed me to add a note here. On comparison with his full account I find that my 
description of the male cone, which was based on a small quantity of material 
and given only for the purposes of comparison, refers to a case which in one respect 
is not normal. It was stated that the bundle supply of the male floral complex 
originates in practically the same way as that supplying the ovule. It is now clear 
that in the male inflorescence axis all the bundles supplying the flowers correspond 
normally with the inner inverse series alone of the female flower, and it is not normal 
to find any of the bundles of the male floral complex inserted further out on the bract- 
bundles in a position corresponding to the outer series supplying the ovule. This 
difference between the male and female axes did not become evident to me till I saw 
Professor Pearson’s paper (and consequently made a re-examination of my material), 
owing to the fact that I first examined an exceptional case in which a few of the 
lowest floral bundles were inserted in this position. 
A comparison between the female cones of the two species investigated 
by Professor Pearson and myself throws some light on the great difference in 
the vascular system of the male axes, i. e. the presence of £ descending ’ bundles in the 
one species and their absence in the other. This is not accompanied by as great 
a difference in the female axes, traces of a descending system being present in the 
female axis of G. scandens (ibid., p. 1106). It appears to me probable that the 
greater or less development of the descending system of bundles in the inflorescence 
axes of this genus is conditioned by the length of the internode and position of 
insertion of the flowers characteristic in the species, and by the stage of development 
of the particular strobilus in question. I have already stated in my paper that in the 
young cone axis of G. scandens no descending bundles were present, but that as the 
ovules increased in size new bundles were laid down, some of which, on entering 
the stem, instead of turning downwards to join the crowded ovular bundles at their 
insertion on the bract-bundles, ran upwards to join the main bundles. 
In the axis of G. Africanum the descending series was far better developed, 
even in the young cone, and the greater the age of the cone the greater the 
development and complication of this series. These facts are probably due to 
the relatively short internode in G. Africanum , and the consequent crowding of the 
cupules and flowers in this species. In G. scandens the young female flowers are at 
first situated closely in the axil of the cupule, but are afterwards carried out on 
a stalk so that they are never inserted by a very broad surface, and above their level of 
insertion there is a long stretch of bare internode beneath the cupule at the base 
of the next node. But in G. Africanum the ovules, sessile at all stages, are inserted 
by their whole base on the stem, above the cupule, and as the ovules develop and their 
base widens, they take up an ever-increasing part of the short internode. Thus it is 
obviously much more convenient for the later formed vascular bundles in the upper 
part of the ovule to be inserted on the main bundles higher up in the node or even in 
the internode above, than to run downwards towards the already complicated mass of 
