and the plant must needs have some extraneous aid ; and further- 

 more, any such aid must come quickly, inasmuch as these fungi by 

 reason of their loose cellular structure are quite short lived. Now 

 one of the most prominent characteristics of nearly every species of 

 this order is that the sporiferous substance has a most abominable, 

 fetid odor — one that can only be compared with that emitted by 

 putrescent animal matter. In fact, so similar to decaying animal 

 organisms is it, that even flies are deceived thereby ; and before the 

 ill-scented mass has had time to drip away it will have been greedily 

 devoured by numbers of these insects. As flies have " no local hab- 

 itation " they give the minute ingested spores a wide dissemination by 

 means of their ejections. It is a well-observed fact that the very 

 common species of " stink-horns " {Phallus impudicus, indusiatus^ etc.) 

 are found in the greatest abundance around human habitations, where 

 they occur under porches, in the door-yard, and in the garden, and 

 often in such numbers, and so frequently as to occasion serious in- 

 convenience. This tendency to become domesticated is thus corre- 

 lated Avith their fetid odor and the presence of those constant com- 

 panions of man — the. flies. More rarely, these malodorous plants are 

 found in woods in the vicinity of villages and cities. In such locali- 

 ties, where flies are less abundant, the same office is often performed for 

 them by other insects — especially by beetles. The only fresh specimen 

 of a Phallus that I ever met with in the woods was being visited by sev- 

 eral individuals of a common species of carrion-beetle — Si/pha Novebo- 

 racensis. A writer in the Science Gossip for Nov. ^ ^879, mentions a case 

 observed by him where a stink-horn *' had its cap almost denuded of the 

 dark slimy mucus which covers it by swarms of ants, which were 

 busily engaged upon what appeared to be to them a dainty feast." 

 There is thus evidently something in the composition of this sporifer- 

 ous substance v/hich proves grateful to the taste of such flesh-eating 

 insects as are attracted to it by its cadaverous odor. Braconnot, as 

 the result of an analysis of this fetid slime, states that it is composed 

 of *' highly animalized fungin, albumen, mucus, superacetate of pot- 

 ash, and of a peculiar acid in combination with potash." It follows 

 from what has been said that those species of these plants which pos- 

 sess the most putrid odor ought to be the commonest and most widely 

 distributed ones. This, as far as observation can be made on the 

 comparatively few species that occur in the temperate zones, is what 

 we find to be the case. Those species, on the other hand, that do 

 not possess a powerful odor tend to become rare. Thus, for instance, 

 Cynophallus caninus is nearly odorless. It has a wide range, being 

 found both in Europe and America, but it is recorded in all the books 

 as being extremely rare and local. In the roth volume of the British 

 Entomology, Curtis figured a peculiar species of Phallus which he 

 states was exhaling a faint odor of violets. On this figure Mr. Berkeley 

 has founded a species and called it P. iosmos. This plant, 

 although it has been carefully searched for, has never been found a 

 second time. Has it become extinct from not offering an odor at- 

 tractive to carrion-eating insects.? Throwing out such species as 

 have been founded on indifferent figures, and not on the plants them- 

 selves, the number of good species of this order which have been 



