M. G. Sykes. 
4i 
NOTES ON THE MORPHOLOGY OF THE SPORANGIUM¬ 
BEARING ORGANS OF THE LYCOPODIACE^E. 
By M. G. Sykes, 
Assistant Lecturer and Demonstrator, Royal Holloway College, 
University of London. 
[With Plates II. and III.] 
HE cones of several of the species described below were kindly 
sent by Mr. E. C. Jones, at the request of Professor Seward; 
others were obtained from material collected by Professor Yapp in 
the Malay Peninsula, by Mr. Stanley Gardiner in Fiji, and by Dr. 
Benson in Fiji, while Professor Weiss was so good as to supply me 
with specimens of Phylloglossum. Most of the plants examined 
were preserved in spirit, but, in a few cases, herbarium specimens 
alone were available ; the double stain, iodine green and eosin, was 
chiefly employed. 
My thanks are due to Professor Seward, both for obtaining 
material for me, and for his kind interest in my work. 
I.—General Description of a Lycopodian Sporophyll. 
Each sporophyll is a leaf-like organ, more or less modified in 
accordance with its special functions, and bearing a single, stalked, 
tangentially placed sporangium, the position of which varies in the 
different species in its relations to the sporophyll and the main axis. 
The vascular bundle which supplies the sporophyll arises some 
distance below its base, from the stele ; it pursues an obliquely 
upward course into the stalk, and traverses the whole length of the 
sporophyll, but does not give off a branch to the sporangium 
pedicel. In the latter, however, some cells with lignified walls are 
usually found, these cells often resembling in character those of the 
layer surrounding the stele in the axis of the cone. 
The sporophyll encloses and protects the sporangium to a 
varying extent in the different species; its epidermis, especially on 
the abaxial surface, is usually composed of cells with strongly 
cuticularised walls ; a mucilage cavity is often found in its basal 
portion ; it may or may not be furnished with a flap which extends 
downwards from its dorsal surface 1 and protects the sporangium 
immediately below, giving to the sporophyll a peltate character. 
1 Goebel, Organography II., p. 503. 
