132 A CYTOLOGICAL INVESTIGATION OF SOME SPECIES 
mination of the chromosome-number was impossible, because the so- 
matic chromosomes are thin, long and bended and overlap one another, 
thus giving a very indistinct picture. 
§ 3. The chromosome-number of Saccharum officinarum L. 
Comparison of the nuclei of PMC of S. officinarum with those of S. 
spontaneum shows at once, that during diakinesis those of sugarcane 

Fig. 24. Fig. 25. 
Fig. 24. Pollentetrad of Saccharum spontaneum (Glagah alas Djatiroto) X 1750. 
Fig. 25. Young pollengrains of the same plant x 1750. 
are distinctly smaller than those of glagah and that the number of ge- 
mini is smaller also. In the different varieties of sugarcane investigated 
the haploid chromosomenumber turned out to be 40. As a consequence 
of irregularities during the reduction division other numbers however 
are frequently found, deviating from 40. There exist varieties in which 
perfectly regular reduction-division of the PMC is always accompanied 
by irregular ones, in other varieties the division is always irregular. 
Ardjoeno-cane, in which regular as well as irregular division occurs, 
shows distinct division-figures. Green German New Guinea-cane also : 
gives very clear karyokinetic figures, but they always are of an irregu- 
lar nature, so that the irregularity is much more apparent than in the 
case of Ardjoeno. We shall therefore first deal with the regular divisions 
of Ardjoeno, subsequently with the irregular ones of G. G. N. G. and 
