ON THE TREMELLINEOUS FUNGI AND THEIR ANALOGUES. 31 
New Notes upon the Tremellineous Fungiand their Analogues. 
By L. R. and C. TunásneE. 
I. WuEN a special organization or a singular anatomical structure 
is common to a very great number of different beings, itis evident 
that the slightest modification of this organization or structure 
deserves the observer's attention; and this is particularly true if 
the modification affects an important apparatus, such as the re- 
produetion in the basidiophorous fungi. This is the reason 
why, in this great family of plants, the little group of the Tre- 
melle and analogous species excites a peculiar interest. The 
Fungi Tremellinei, indeed, are not distinguished from other 
Basidiomycetes merely by their mucous consistency; for this 
occurs also in certain Hydna, in Merulius, &c.; they more- 
over present in the construction of their hymeniwm some pe- 
culiar characters which make it easy to recognize them. Their 
basidia, or hymenial and sporophorous cells, are shaped, as we 
have shown formerly *, after two distinct types. Some (for in- 
stance, those of the Dacryomycetes and Guepinia Peziza Tul.) are 
at first narrowly claviform, then they extend in two thick and 
divaricated arms or processes, each of which bears one reniform 
and divided spore. By this forked appearance, the basidia of the 
Daeryomycetes are easily distinguished from the similarly dispo- 
rous, but obtuse, basidia of certain Hypochni and other non- 
mucilaginous Hymenomycetes. 
The second type of basidia occurs amongst the genuine Tre- 
melle, where these sporophorous cells are subglobose, or quite 
spherical, and usually divided from the top to the bottom, into 
four equal parts. These segments become divergent from each 
other or remain united; but all grow, in the same way, into the 
form of long threads or tubes, which reach the periphery or super- 
ficies of the fungus, and there produce reniform and generally 
undivided spores. 
If, notwithstanding M. Fuckel’s contrary opinion, we admit, 
with the ancient mycologists, that an undoubted analcgy unites 
the Auricularie with the Tremelle, then we must mention a 
third kind of basidia, very distinct from the former ones; we 
mean the sporophorous tubes that M. De Bary has seen and 
described in Auricularia sambucina Mart. (Hirneola Auricula 
Jude Berk.), consisting of upright and thick threads, each one 
* See the * Ann. des Sc. Nat., 3rd ser., t. xix. (1853), pp. 193-231, pls. x.-xiii. 
