82 



HARDWIC.KE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



[April 1, 1SG9. 



globose black peridia become visible among the 

 flocci, clothed with and supported by alternately 

 branched, obscurely jointed filaments, the branches 

 of which generally form an acute angle with the 

 stem. The ramification of these is very peculiar, 

 the stem and main shaft of each subdivision being 

 almost constantly abbreviated and surmounted by 

 the branchlet given off near the apex ; this, again, 

 is often abbreviated, and another branchlet given 

 off, which again surpasses it ; and occasionally the 

 same circumstance takes place a third time. The 

 apices are clavate and colourless; the rest of the 

 filaments, when viewed by transmitted light, brown, 

 even, and pellucid; a few globose conidia are 

 usually attached to them. The peridium is thin, 

 black to the naked eye, of an olive-brown under the 

 microscope, filled with a mass of linear extremely 

 transparent asci, each containing a single row of 

 broadly elliptic chocolate sporidia." 



A mould, described by Link as 

 Oidium chartarum, may possibly be 

 nothing more thau an early condition 

 of one of the foregoing. 



There are two other moulds whicb 

 appear on paper. One, called Stachj- 

 botrijs atra, is usually on millboard. 

 The threads are erect and branched, 

 bearing heads which consist of a whorl 

 of colourless very short brancblets, 

 each of which bears a brown septate 

 spore, so as io form a globose head of 

 spores. The other is named Sporo- 

 cybe alternata, and is greyish-black, 

 forming little orbicular patches : it is 

 so small as scarcely to be visible with- 

 out a lens; the threads are almost 

 erect, and branched in a zig-zag man- 

 ner, each branch being slightly swolleu 

 at the tip, and studded with oblong 

 sporidia. 



I think that I have enumerated all 

 the fungi which habitually establish 

 themselves on paper - , some rarely, 

 others commonly ; or at least all 

 which belong to this country. Not 

 long since, some paper from Burmab 

 came into my possession, which was covered with 

 a species of C/uetomium, described by Corda as 

 Chcetomium Indicum, perhaps the most beautiful of 

 all in that genus ; but this cannot be regarded as 

 a British species, although developed after its 

 arrival. 



No one who becomes- acquainted with the fungi 

 found upon paper will, like " J. T. Y.," confound 

 them with the dendritic spots, so long a puzzle ; 

 now, apparently, nearer solution. The confusion 

 which seemed to exist in the minds of some readers 

 must be my excuse for this— rather too lechnical— 

 communication. 



"TOMMY TRY." 



rnHE beach at Exmouth, throughout a great part 

 -"- of its extent, is sandy, and affords a consider- 

 able number of shells. Of these I obtained in a 

 few days about thirty species, of which the greater 

 part were marine, but there were one or two land 

 and fresh -water kinds, whicb had doubtless floated 

 down the river Exe. 



I noticed on the sand large numbers of Medusae, 

 which varied from the size of a crown-piece to nine 

 inches in diameter. These appeared to be of two 

 species, the most common of which was of an opale- 

 scent white, with stripes of lilac ; a second was of a 

 smoky white, with darker marks of the same colour. 

 I was anxious to take home some of these, but on 

 handling them I received a sting similar to that from 

 a nettle. I afterwards heard that a species of this 

 class is called the " sea-nettle." I avenged myself 



Fig. 5:f. Auriculated aurelia {AtateUa aitrita). 



for the sting by afterwards chopping up many of 

 these animals with my spade. 



The rocks further down the river afforded nume- 

 rous limpets — Patella vulgata and P. pellucida ; the 

 dog-whelk, Purpura laplllus ; and a peculiar species 

 of alga?, which, although truly cryptogamic, bad 

 somewhat the appearance of the grass wrck, Zostera 

 marina. This plant reminded me of some weed 

 which had been brought home by a sea captain from 

 the Bahama banks, and was believed by him to be 

 the same as the' floating marine plants which served 

 to assure the mutinous crew of Columbus of the 

 existence of land in that part of the world. It met 



