482 Harper—Nuclear Phenomena in the Smuts. 
of spindle formation, etc.; but the equatorial plate stage is very- 
distinct and shows a sharply pointed bipolar spindle, whose 
fibres end in deep staining granules at the poles (Fig. 2). No 
polar radiations at this stage have been observed. The chromo¬ 
somes are rather densely massed at the equator and are proba¬ 
bly eight or ten in number. Frequently in the neighborhood 
of the spindle the nucleole can be seen, generally somewhat re¬ 
duced in size but still a dense red staining granule. 
In the dispirem stage the daughter nuclei appear merely as 
dense flattened disks of chromatin still connected by the old 
spindle fibres (Fig. 3); as is the case at this stage in the divis¬ 
ion of the ascus nuclei, as I have already described it for Peziza 
Stevensoniana. 1 The daughter nuclei become free from each other 
and wander to the opposite ends of the promycelium before they 
have fully completed the reconstruction stages (Fig. 4). Here 
they soon divide again, and the four nuclei become distributed 
at equal intervals in the promycelium, and three cross walls are 
built forming a typical four-celled promycelium. Budding then 
begins (Figs. 6 and 7); the conidia drop off and enter on a yeast¬ 
like period of growth, as has already been fully described by 
Brefeld. 
The above account of U. scabiosa represents a case where a 
typical four-celled promycelium is formed, such as Brefeld re¬ 
gards as a typical hemibasidium. The spores produce regularly 
only a single promycelium and all subsequent conidial growth 
originates from this one conidiophore. 
In some species however a series of promycelia are budded off 
from a single spore and these may be two or three or one celled. 
A type which produces series of three celled promycelia is U. 
antherarum (Fr.), growing in the anthers of many Caryophyl- 
laceae, and for which the nuclear phenomena in spore formation 
have been referred to above. This is the fungus which develops 
its spores in the anthers of the host plant, thereby emasculat¬ 
ing them and apparently availing itself of the means for the 
scattering of its spores which the host plant intended for pollen 
distribution. 
1 Ber. d. deutsch. Pot. Ges., XII, 1895. 
