Spermatogenesis in the Bryophyta 
BY 
MALCOLM WILSON, B.Sc., A.R.C.S. 
Senior Demonstrator in Botany , Royal College of Science , London. 
With Plates XXXVII and XXXVIII and three Figures in the Text . 
A LTHOUGH the structure and development of the spermatozoids in 
. the Bryophyta have been the subject of numerous investigations, com- 
paratively little information is available upon the earlier history of the 
spermatogenic cells. The majority of investigators have confined them- 
selves to descriptions of the formation of the spermatozoid from the sper- 
matid. Several papers have recently appeared on the spermatogenesis of 
the Hepaticae, but those dealing with the Musci are very few in number. 
J. and W. Docters van Leeuwen-Reijnvaan (40, 41, 42) have recently pub- 
lished several on this latter group, and, as pointed out by Strasburger (66), 
the conclusions arrived at by these observers have emphasized the necessity 
for further investigation. 
The first reference to spermatozoids in plants was made by Schmiedel(55) 
in 1747. In his ‘ leones plantarum et analyses partium he described the 
movement of the spermatozoids in Fossombronia pusilla . 
Other scattered observations followed, but the earliest comparative 
investigations in this subject were made by Hofmeister (28) and described 
in his ‘ Vergleichende Untersuchungen ? in 1850. In several of the Hepaticae 
he found that the small rectangular cells of the nearly ripe antheridium each 
gave rise to one spermatozoid. The latter in Pellia epiphylla 1 consists 
of a spirally coiled body with two cilia attached to the thicker end, and, on 
its escape from the antheridium, it is still enclosed in the wall of the mother- 
cell. This subsequently ruptures, and the spermatid is set free, provided at 
the thin end with a vesicle. In the Musci the development is similar. In 
Sphagnum acutifolium the developing antheridia are figured, and the mature 
spermatozoid is shown, provided with two cilia at the anterior end. In 
Phascum cuspidatum spermatozoids are figured still enclosed within the 
walls of the polygonal mother-cells. The account given by Schimper (54) 
in 1858 of the spermatozoid of Sphagnum is very similar. 
With the exception of Pellia , Hofmeister was unable to find cilia 
in the spermatozoids of the Hepaticae, but in the following year they were 
described and figured by Thuret (68) in Pellia , Marchantia , Fossombronia , 
1 p. 30, Eng. Trans. 
[Annals of Botany, Vol. XXV. No. XC VIII. April, 1911.] 
