G. Franc[358] was one of the first to notice this twisting in _Galium_, and M. Duchartre,[359] in mentioning a similar instance, gives the following explanation of the appearance which will be found to apply to most of these cases. In the normal stem of _Galium Mollugo_ the branches are opposite in each verticil and crossed in the two successive ones. The stem is four-angled, each angle having a nerve. Each of these nerves, springing from the origin of a branch in one whorl, terminates in the interval which separates the point of origin of the two branches in the whorl next above it. In the deformed stem one of the nerves corresponds to the insertion of a branch, its neighbour is in the adjoining vacant space; hence it results that four nerves correspond to two branches and to two consecutive interspaces, and hence the analogy between a single normal internode provided with its two branches and its four nerves. What confirms this inference is that the nerve, which begins at the point of origin of a branch, after making one spiral turn round the stem, terminates in the interval that separates the two following branches, just as in a branch of the normal stem it ends in the upper whorl between the two next branches. The torsion, then, in this _Galium_ caused the separation of the two opposite branches of the same verticil, and placed them one above another, and this being reproduced in all the whorls, all the branches come to be arranged on the same longitudinal line. The leaves are susceptible of the same explanation; they are inserted in groups of three or four in one arc round the origin of each branch. In the malformation each series or group of four leaves, with its central branch, is equivalent to half a whorl of the natural plant with its axillary branch. In other words, the malformation consists in a torsion of the stem, which separates each whorl into two distinct halves; these half-whorls, with their axillary branches, are placed on a single longitudinal series one above another. This case is quoted at some length, as it is an admirable example of a very common form of malformation in these plants.