confluens and the Morphology of the Ascocarp . 327 
their environment endows them with capacity for independent 
growth, or, as Loeb puts it, they contain all the elements 
necessary for development parthenogenetically, but are 
hindered by some conditions in their environment. In view 
of such facts as these it cannot be considered as at all 
surprising that, under the relatively artificial methods of 
nutrition employed by Brefeld and Moller, the spermatia 
experimented with should have been stimulated to the degree 
of vegetative activity they showed. Indeed in view of Loeb’s 
researches, it would seem impossible to further utilize the test 
of germination without conjugation as a means of positively 
determining the sexual or nonsexual nature of reproductive 
cells. The whole literature relating to the morphology and 
functions of the Lichen-spermogonia prior to 1884 has been 
thoroughly reviewed in De Bary’s handbook (13, p. 240 ), and 
I need not discuss it further here. 
In view of all these varied observations, both old and new, 
the existence of trichogynes and carpogonia in the Lichens, 
essentially similar to those in the red Algae, must be regarded 
as established. The most essential phenomena involved in 
the behaviour of the nuclei are still to be worked out, but the 
sexual significance of the apparatus from which the ascocarp 
arises can hardly be questioned by any one not already 
committed to some other view. 
In an attempt to discredit the results of my study of 
Sphaerotheca , Dangeard ( 8 ) has investigated the same form 
and has published a paper with numerous illustrations, quite 
a number of which might have been copied from my own 
figures. This paper presents once more the author’s theories 
as to the sexuality of the Ascomycetes, but is also a manifest 
effort to take account of well-known facts as to the method of 
development of the ascocarp in the Erysipheae, which he 
had hitherto seen fit to ignore. 
In considering Dangeard’s views it is to be noted that there 
are two problems to be solved in the development of the 
ascocarp of Sphaerotheca. First, does the ascocarp take its 
origin from a sexual apparatus, consisting of antheridium and 
