332 Harper.—Sexual Reproduction in Pyronema 
it agrees very exactly with the method of development 
described by Bauke (2) for the ascocarp and pycnidium 
of Pleospora , though Miss Nichols does not refer to this 
author. De Bary had already expressed the view regarding 
this method of ascocarp-formation, that it is quite funda¬ 
mentally different from that in other Ascomycetes and is 
to be interpreted as a case of apogamy. We shall need 
to know more than Miss Nichols describes of the nuclear 
phenomena in these initial cells, and of the development of 
the ascogenous cells before an interpretation of this method 
of ascocarp-formation can be attempted. The account given 
of the sexual organs in Ceratostoma and Hypocopra is not 
widely different from that of Woronin for Sordaria , as Miss 
Nichols points out. 
Because of the large size and conspicuous occurrence of 
the sexual apparatus above the substratum, Pyronema was 
one of the first Ascomycetes to be thoroughly investigated. 
R. and C. Tulasne (35) observed in i 860 the presence of 
large globular vesicles on the mycelium, which they recognized 
as the first indication of approaching fruit-formation. They 
called these vesicles macrocysts, but failed to discover their 
sexual character or that they were of two kinds. 
De Bary (11, p. 11 ) in 1863 published a further account 
of the Fungus in which he points out that these vesicular 
cells are in pairs consisting of a thicker flask-shaped oogonium 
and a club-shaped antheridium. He describes the groups 
or rosettes consisting of several of these paired bodies as 
arising from one or a small number of mycelial twigs. He 
also observed a gradual disappearance of the protoplasm 
from the pairs as they become enclosed in the enveloping 
hyphae of the hypothecium. He also finally settles the 
point that there is no fertilization of the asci by the para- 
physes, and throws doubt on the existence of the conidial 
fructification earlier described by Tulasne. He was unable, 
however, to find an actual fusion between the peculiar paired 
bodies which he describes. 
In this respect he left the matter exactly in the condition 
