THE HONEY FUNGUS 149 



Microscopic details of the fructification. The general 

 appearance of fructifications has been described in the 

 previous section. A few details of mycological interest may 

 here be added. The young sporophores arise singly, or in 

 clumps, as masses of whitish hyphae, either growing from 

 the extremity of a rhizomorphic branch or from the white 

 mycelial sheets which lie hidden beneath the bark of diseased 

 trees. They are most commonly found on or near the 

 ground, but may arise 6 ft. or more uj) a trunk, this position 

 being especially frequent on Scots or Austrian pine. The 

 pileus is early delimited from the stipe by an annular furrow, 

 on each side of which the young toadstools become swollen. 

 The more pronounced swelling on the upper side becomes 

 the pileus ; the lesser swelling on the lower side forms the 

 veil. Hartig's drawing of this stage is reproduced in the 

 translation of de Bary's Comparative Morphology, fig. 133. 

 The young veil soon becomes congruent with the margin of 

 the pileus, and the latter by greater growth on the upper 

 side becomes curved so that the annulus is not unduly 

 stretched. Inside the ring-shaped cavity between the veil 

 and the stipe the gills develop, and when they are sufficiently 

 mature to bear ripe spores, the veil is ruptured by increased 

 growth on the lower side of the pileus. 



The ruptm'e occm's near the margin of the pileus, so that 

 the veil remains attached to the stipe and forms the annulus, 

 which when fresh may be as much as a centimetre in breadth. 

 In the early stages the pileus is completely covered by 

 a skin which is continuous with the veil, but with the final 

 expansion of the former this skin is ruptured in many 

 places and remains in the form of scales on the upper 

 surface. 



The arrangement of the gills is shown in figs. 60 and 61. 

 Each gill is entirely covered by the hymenium, a layer 

 composed of hasidia and paraphyses (fig. 62). Each basidium 

 commonly bears four spores on sterigmata, not unlike those 

 of Fames annosus, but basidia with two or three spores are 

 occasionally found. The dispersal mechanism of the spores 

 is like that of Fomes annosus, i. e. the spores are thrown 



