Finally, there exist in the _Ascomycetes_ certain organs of reproduction, diverse spore-bearing apparatus, pycnidia, and others, which, like the spermogonia, usually precede ascophorous fruits. The real nature of the spermogonia and spermatia should therefore be regarded as, at present, very uncertain; as regards, however, the spermatia which have never been seen to germinate, perhaps it is as well not to absolutely reject the first opinion formed concerning them, or perhaps they might be thought to perform the part of androspores, attributing to that expression the meaning which Pringsheim gives it in the _Conferoæ_. The experiments performed with the spermatia which do not germinate, and with the spermogonia of the Uredines, do not, at any rate, appear to justify the reputed masculine or fecundative nature of these organs. The spermogonia constantly accompany or precede fruits of _Æcidium_, whence naturally follows the presumption that the first are in a sexual relation to the second. Still, when Tulasne cultivated _Endophyllum sempervivum_, he obtained on some perfectly isolated rosettes of _Sempervivum_ some _Æcidium_ richly provided with normal and fertile spores, without any trace of spermogonia or of spermatia. [A] M. Tulasne has devoted a chapter to the spermogonia of the Uredines in his memoir, to which we have already alluded. [B] Oeersted, in "Verhandl der König. Dän. Gesell. Der Wissensch," 1st January, 1865; De Bary, "Handbuch der Physiol. Botanik" (1866), p. 172; "Annales des Sci. Nat." (5^me sér.), vol. v. (1866), p. 366. [C] Van Tieghem and Le Monnier, in "Annales des Sci. Nat." (1873), vol. xvii. p. 261. [D] Brefeld, "Bot. Unt. uber Schimmelpilze," p. 31. [E] De Bary, "Morphologie und Physiologie der Pilze," cap. 5, p. 160; "Ann. des Sci. Nat." (1866), p. 343. [F] Cornu, in "Ann. des Sci. Nat." (5^me sér.), vol. xv. p. 1 (1872). [G] Pringsheim's "Jahrbucher," vol. ii. p. 169. [H] De Bary, in "Annales des Sciences Naturelles" (5^me sér.), vol. v. (1866), p. 343; Hoffmeister's "Handbook" (Fungi), cap. v. p. 155. [I] De Bary, in "Annales des Sci. Nat." (4^me sér.), vol. xx. p. 129. [J] De Bary, in "Annales des Sciences Naturelles" (5^me sér.), p. 343. [K] Woronin, in De Bary's "Beitr. zur. Morph. und Physiol. der Pilze," ii. (1866), pp. 1-11. [L] Tulasne, "Ann. des Sci. Nat." (5^me sér.), October, 1866, p. 211. [M] Tulasne, "On the Phenomena of Copulation in certain Fungi," in "Ann. des Sci. Nat." (1866), p. 211. [N] De Bary, "Morphologie und Phys. der Pilze," cap. v., p. 162. [O] Berkeley, in "Journ. Hort. Soc." vol ii. p. 107; Tulasne, "Ann. d. Sc. Nat." (4^me sér.), vol. ii. tab. 12. [P] Tulasne, "New Researches on the Reproductive Apparatus of Fungi;" "Comptes Rendus," vol. xxxv. (1852), p. 841.