Order Gasteromtcetes.' Sub-order Trichogastres.^ 



Plate XIV. 



LYCOPERDON S ACC ATUM, i^n.. 



Gen. Char. Lycopekdon. Peridium membranaceous, with an adnate sub-persistent bark, within furnished at 

 the base with a spongy sterile stratum. Capillitium unequal. 



Spec. Char. Lycoperdon saccatdm. Peridium pulvinate, lentiform, obtuse, depressed, constricted at the 

 base. Stem tluck, subequal, both the peridium and stem covered with a very thin adnate spinulose bark, that of 

 the peridium bursting into areolas. Capillitium compact, contiguous ; spores dusky-fuliginous, placed on very 

 short pedicels. 



Ilab. In marshy ground composed of sandy peat, under Scotch Pines. At Keston, Kent, 1840 and 1842. 



Tills very singular Lycoperdon was found for the first time in England at the date given above. In 

 the Autumn of that year it was abundant in one favoured spot, in company with Boletus larkhms and 

 B. aniiulafus (of Persoon), a favoured spot so far as that mycological treasures were displayed there in variety 

 and profusion, but notliing else, the scanty grass was too rank and sonr to tempt the cattle, and probably no 

 foot but that of the inveterate Fungus-hunter invaded the pet nook, lying as it did, with the gloomy shadow 

 of Scotch Firs to the south, exposed to the bitter North-east, and up to the ancles, when filled with rain, 

 like a sponge. Improvement came ; an amateur Liebig pared, and bru-ned, and ploughed, and sowed (we 

 do not know if he ever reaped), the desolation of lois agricidtiu-al mania had blighted our harvest, and tlie 

 finest crop of corn would have been worse than thorns and tliistles in our eyes. 



The Li/coperdon saccatum is a moderate sized Pujf-ball placed upon a tail swoUen stem. In youth the 

 entire plant appears to consist internally of a homogeneous soft wliite substance, and the division between 

 the barren stratum forming the top of the stem, and the receptacle of the spores, is not visible ; in a very 

 short time, however, the fiesh of the stem becomes yellow, the spores grow dark olive, and the whole interiom- 

 of the head flows out, bursting it irregularly, in the form of a most offensive deep greenish liquid, wluch 

 carries off not only the spores, but the whole peridium or jjuff-head in one general decaj', after which the 

 stem, not being hollow, but elastic and spongy, remains long entire, with the barren stratum surmounting 

 it. So remarkable a Fungus can scarcely be mistaken, indeed no member of the Lycoperdon family at all 

 resembles it, except a variety of L. gemmatum, the Lycoperdon Proteus of Sowerby, wliich has an elongated 

 stem ; it is, however, much smaller in all its proportions, and the head is covered with spinulose warts, 

 neither does it send forth its spores in a liquid as L. saccatum does, but they are discharged from a prominent 



' From yasTTJii, the stomach, and jivktis, a, fungus; hymenium included in the receptacle. 

 2 From 6p\^, a hair, and yasrrip, the stomach ; receptacle filled with floccose hairs on which the spores are 

 placed. 



