CHAPTER III. SPORES OF FUNGI. 



59 



A very large majority of Fungi have spreading hairs on their surface, which 

 arise as branches from the hyphae of the compound sporophores and show this 

 origin even where its final structure is pseudo-parenchymatous. Some of them come 

 from the hyphae of the surface itself, some originate at a greater or less depth 

 beneath it and pass obliquely to the outside through 

 the layers of tissue that cover their point of origin. They 

 are simple cells or cell-rows and branched or unbranched, 

 and scarcely yield to the hair-formations 01 the- higher 

 plants in variety of form, direction, size, colour, structure, 

 and thickening of their membranes ; the most varied series 

 of these formations is to be found in Peziza and the allied 

 Ascomycetes, and in Erysiphe and Chaetomium. 



In many cases the hairs are closely combined in tufts, 

 which appear to the naked eye according to the species as 

 bristles, scales, or warts, as for instance on the surface of 

 the pileus of Polyporus hirsutus and P. hispidus, of 

 Hydnum auriscalpium, Tremellodon gelatinosus, &c., or 

 as cylindrical tufts expanding into the shape of a funnel 



at their extremity, such as are found on the sterile surface of the pileus of 

 Fistulina hepatica, and from their shape were once described as rudiments of the 

 tubuli of the hymenial surface \ If the superficial felting of hair is very thick, it may 

 be a question whether it should not be considered to be a cortical layer, and the 

 determination must rest on what is suitable in each particular case. 



Where the compound sporophore is very close to the substratum, single 

 hairs or tufts of hairs often assume the character of rhizoids. 



Here would naturally be the place to speak of the Lichen-thallus and especially 

 of its fruticose and foliose heteromerous forms; but it will be more convenient to 

 reserve this part of the subject to Division III. 



Fl<",. 25. Polypor 



idus. 



Thin 



longitudinal section through the surface 

 of the pileus ; c rind, m medullary hyphae. 

 Magn. 190 times. 



CHAPTER III. SPORES OF FUNGI. 



SECTION XIV. The propagation of the Fungi, in the widest sense of that word 

 which implies the production of new bions through a mother-individual, is generally 

 effected by the abjunction, and in most cases by the complete separation, of cells from 

 the maternal structure, which then develope into daughter-bions if the necessary 

 conditions are present. The single cell thus abjointed from the mother and capable 

 of this development into one or more than one bion we term here a spore; 

 empirically we fix that moment and condition of its development, in which 

 abjunction from the mother as its nutrient source is effected, as the moment 

 and condition of its ripeness or maturity ; the commencement of the further develop- 

 ment of the ripe spore is its germination. 



1 Fries, Syst. Mycol. I. 396. 



