FUNGI. 



[ 281 ] 



FUNGI. 



Botrytis (figs. 79, 80, 26/), the tips of the 

 Fig. 267. 



Fig. 269. 



Botrytis vulgaris. 

 Fertile filaments. Magnified 200 diams. 



fertile filaments are branched and clothed 

 with heaps of spores arising from short pe- 

 dicels. In Penicillium (PL 20. fig. 15), the 

 filament which rises np forks at the end, 

 each branch forking again, and so on, until 

 a close, tufted pencil of branches is formed, 

 each branch bearing a bead-like row of spores, 

 which drop oif separate!}-. Innumerable 

 modifications of this mode of fructification 

 are met with in the microscopic Fungi, and 

 the same plan also forms the basis of the 

 fructification of some of the highest forms. 

 The way in which the greater complexity 

 arises is by an increased development of the 

 structures supporting the layer of tissue (%- 

 menium) upon which the spores are borne. 

 Thus in the leathery Fungi growing over 

 damp trunks of trees and dead wood, such 

 as the Hydna, ThelephorcB, Hexagonia (figs. 

 268, 269), the conspicuous fungous mass 



Fig. 268. 



Hexagonia glabra. 

 Upper svirface. Nat. size. 



(which is all that ordinary observers notice) 

 developed from a fiocculent mycelium im- 

 bedded in the matrix on which the plant 

 grows, is a fruit, composed of dense cellular 



Hexagonia glabra. Nat. size. 

 Lower surface, with orifices of the hymenium. 



tissue, and possessing pits, channels, cavi- 

 ties, or the like, the walls of which are clothed 

 with papillose cells, each bearing four fi-ee 

 sporules, which drop oiF singly to reproduce 

 the plant. The Mushroom, as gathered and 

 brought to table, is merely the 'fruit' of the 

 Fungus [Agaricus), and similar cells bearing 

 fovu- sporules are found clothing the flat 

 sides of the paper-like plates or ' gills' which 

 radiate on the under side of the flat ' cap' of 

 the Fungus. (See Basidiospores.) 



Another mode of fructification is met with 

 in the Fungi, and by this they in some cases 

 come exceedingly close to the Lichens. The 

 simplest form of the second kind of fructifi- 

 cation is seen in the ' Mildews ' {Eurotium, 

 Mucor, &c.), where the upright filament 

 arising from the fiocculent mycelium does 

 not bear free spores, as in Penicillium, Botry- 

 tis, &c., but a comparatively large sac, fijled 

 with minute sporules; and these sporules 

 are scattered by the bm-sting of the sac. In 

 the HelvellcB, PezizcB, Spathulea (fig. 40), 

 Leotia (fig. 42), &c., structm-es of a fleshy 

 or leathery character, growing upon damp 

 wood, &c., we have counterparts to the 

 Hydna,Thelephor(B, &c., since they have fruits 

 arising from a flocculent mycelium, but their 

 spore-bearing cells appear as definite groups 

 of vesicles or sacs of elongated form,producing 

 sporules (usually eight) in their cavities. In the 

 Truffles {Tuber, Elaphomyces, fig. 187), &c. 

 the spores are found in fours or eights, in sacs 

 in the internal convoluted substance (while 

 in the Puff"-balls, w^here the internal mass 

 finally breaks up into powder, the spores are 

 developed free, as in the Agarics, &c.). More 

 minute accounts of these structures will be 

 found under Thecaspores and the various 

 genera. 



It was long imagined that these two modes 

 of producing the spores aff'orded a firm basis 

 for the classification of the Fungi, but recent 

 discoveries seem to indicate that characters 



