Olive—Cytological Studies on Ceratiormyxd. 7,61 
cleavage is already completed. It was the occurrence of these 
large cells, with their large, conspicuous nuclei, which first 
struck my attention some years ago and which led to this study. 
The chromatin of the majority of such nuclei appears contract¬ 
ed, as shown in Figures 7-9 1 , and lying eccentrically in the large 
nuclear cavity. Such a phenomenon at once recalls the condition 
which has been characterized as synapsis. Frequently the mass 
can he seen to be joined to the nuclear membrane by means of 
a slender connection (Fig. 7), thus showing, presumably, 
its polarized character. In the binucleated cell shown in Fig¬ 
ure 7, both of the nuclei appear to be in early synapsis. A 
similar condition obtains in the four-nucleated mass illustra¬ 
ted in Figure 4. From a comparison of these figures, we note 
that this synaptic condition begins either near the close of 
cleavage (see Figs. 4 and 7), or at about the time cleavage is 
completed (Figs. 8 and 9). There is as yet no indication of 
shrinkage of the chromatin seen in the uninucleated cell 
shown in Figure 6, which represents the condition of a few 
cells scattered here and there among those figured in Figures 
8 and 9, but I am inclined to think that this indicates a stage 
immediately preceding synapsis. 
Should these figures indeed truly represent, as I firmly be¬ 
lieve, a synaptic state of the nuclei, we must conclude that this 
condition lasts only a comparatively short time; this being 
quite at variance with the long period which is said to characr 
terize synapsis in certain plants (Allen, ? 05). Famintzin and 
Woronin state that from the beginning of the uninucleated con¬ 
dition up to the formation of mature spores takes only about 
five to six hours. Since part of this time, as we shall now see, 
must be given up to the two nuclear divisions which take place 
in the developing spore ? it is obvious that only a few hours at 
best are left for the nuclei to pass completely through the con¬ 
dition resembling synapsis. 
That this peculiar condition of the nuclei, which lasts 
through nearly the whole of the subsequent spore formation, is 
a natural phenomenon and not an artifact is indicated by the 
two divisions which closely follow. First, however, attention 
should be called to the fact that, in Ceratiomyxa, the division 
