44 Mr. Woopwarp’s Effay towards an 
flat; but if that be dry, the rays will be fpeedily divefted of their 
fpongy coat, which will foon crack and peel off, and then they will 
foon contract; and, if nothing impede their natural tendency, 
will be incurved, and confequently raifed fomewhat upon their tips. 
It is evident that if grafs, mofs, or even loofe mould, fhould be under 
the plant at this time, fome may be caught up and retained by them, 
In dry weather the thick fpongy coat foon cracks, and puts on that 
teffelated appearance which is reprefented by Mich. t. 100. f. 6. 
and in Mr. Bryant's plate f. 4. in which ftate it has been confidered 
by fome authors as a diftinét fpecies: but this appearance is of 
{fhort duration, being only the prelude to that coat's peeling off; after 
which the plant becoming very light, 1s frequently removed by the 
wind far from its native place; which accounts for this fpecies 
being rarely found two years together on the fame fpot. 
I2. Such is the mode of vegetation common to Lycoperdon 
ftellatum and coliforme ; but the fornicatum of Hudfon is of a very 
different nature. This plant arifes from a round or egg-fhaped volva, 
which is of a thicker fubftance than that of ftellatum, and like that 
is fixed in the ground ; but which it does not, like that, quit upon 
opening. The fornicatum when ripe fplits at the fummit into four 
equal, or nearly. equal parts; the head, with a correfponding 
number of rays, is by the opening of the volva raifed from within . 
its cavity; and the rays in a fhort time acquiring firmnefs * *, are 
fixed in their arched fituation, each refting on its correfponding 
* The fpongy coat is not nearly fo thick in this fpecies, on the rays of the plant, as on 
the ftellatum of Hudfon, though thicker than on the ftellatum of Bryant; and its pe- 
duncle is obfervable when the volva firft burfts. And here it is neceffary again to 
caution the reader to remember, that the fornicatum as defcribed by Mr. B. is confidered 
as a different plant from that of Hudfon, which I am here defcribing; and that if it be 
proved that the latter is not a variety of the former, as he afferts, his defcription of the one 
plant has nothing to do with the other, and all his arguments deduced from fuch de- 
rem mutt fall to the ground. 
fegment 
