300 
PROFESSOR W. C. WILLIAMSON ON THE ORGANIZATION 
figured by Mr. Worthington Smith in the ‘Gardeners’ Chronicle’ for October 20, 
1877, under the name of P eronosporites antiquarius. Mr. Smith figures and describes 
the hyphse of the Fungus as having septse, and its supposed oogonia as containing 
zoospores. The existence of these zoospores was denied by Mr. Murray, of the British 
Museum, in the ‘ Academy ’ for November 17,1877. Still more recently another example 
of the plant has been met with at Halifax in the cabinet of Mr. Spencer. Fragments 
of Lepidodendroid bark, the cells of which are filled with fragmentary hyphse, but 
with few traces of oogonia, also from Halifax, are in the cabinet of Mr. Cash. I 
have had the opportunity of examining all these specimens with the exception of 
that in Mr. Carruthers’ cabinet, which example he informs me is a very imperfect 
one compared with those more recently discovered. 
I have failed to find any traces of septa in the hyphse of this plant, and I quite 
agree with Mr. Murray in his opinion that no zoospores exist in any one of them. 
Some of the oogonia (fig. 33) contain black coaly matter such as is frequently found 
in the ordinary cellular tissues of carboniferous plants; but I believe this to be the 
result of infiltration, since I find it extended into the hollow tubes of some of 
the hyphse (as in fig. 33, a), and is not confined to the oogonia themselves. Having 
examined the actual specimen described and figured by Mr. Smith with the aid of a 
Zeiss oil-immersion lens, I have had no hesitation in arriving at the same conclusion 
as Mr. Murray has done, viz. : that its oogonia contain no zoospores. The plant has 
been an unicellular branching mycelium with numerous dilatations on the branching 
hypliae, which dilatations seem to have been oogonia. No septal division separates the 
cavities of these oogonia from the hollow hyphse prolonged from them. 
Fig. 28 is a siaecimen from Mr. Spencer’s cabinet. The fungus is here inclosed 
within the cells, c, of a fragment of Lepidodendroid bark. At a is a branching 
mycelium, whilst numerous extremely thin-walled capsules, b, are seen either 
detached or, as at V, connected laterally in a sessile manner with the hypha. Some 
of the capsules are round, others pyriform and with short hyphoid necks. In this 
specimen the hyphse display no traces of septa, neither are there the slightest indi¬ 
cations of spores within the capsules. 
Fig. 36 represents a portion of the specimen already figured by Mr. Smith, for the 
loan of which I am indebted to Mr. Young, F.C.S. Figs. 37 and 37a represent 
fragments of plants from Mr. Spencer’s Halifax specimen. Figs. 29 to 33 represent 
various forms observed in Mr. Butterworth’s section, and which correspond very 
closely with the Halifax one. In fig. 29 we have the branching hypha, the branch 
bearing the base of an oogonium, a. In fig. 30 an oogonium, a, gives off three hyphoid 
branches, one of which is not only connected with a second oogonium at b, but displays 
a swelling at c, which appears to be the commencement of a third one. In fig. 31, a, 
we have three oogonia connected by two hyphse ; at c is the free base of a large 
oogonium, and at d is another, but of smaller size. Fig. 32 again exhibits two 
oogonia connected by a single hypha, but each oogonium again gives off another hypha 
