286 



RESEARCHES ON FUNGI 



/ / / 



Fig 



r) 



Just as with the fruit-bodies of Ciliaria scutellata, the fruit-bodies 

 of Melastiza miniafa and Cheilymenia vinacea were marked before 

 being gathered in the ice-house and then were removed to the 

 laboratory and sectioned by hand. The investigation of the 



hymenia revealed that in both species the asci, 

 all across each disc, had become slightly curved 

 at their free ends toward the door of the ice- 

 house, i.e. toward the source of hght, and were 

 therefore positively heUotropic (Fig. 136, C, D, 

 and E ; the arrows in C indicate the directions 

 in which the asci pointed). 



The heliotropic curvature of the asci of 

 Melastiza miniafa and Cheilymenia vinacea in 

 unilateral light is confined, as in Ciliaria scutel- 

 lata, to the free ends of the asci and, in the ice- 

 house, it resulted in the opercula being pushed 

 over toward the light, so that the spores were 

 probably shot out from each ascus obliquely 

 upwards at an angle of 45° to the vertical, the 

 inclination being toward the source of hght. 

 Here, as in Ciliaria scutellata, it was observed 

 that, as the asci discharge, they straighten them- 

 selves out somewhat so that the curvature of 

 their ends almost disappears and the operculum 

 in an exploded ascus comes to be obliquely set 

 at the end of the ascus but always on the side 

 from which the light has come (Fig. 136, cf. D 

 and E). The oblique position of the operculum in 

 an exploded ascus in such a fungus as Cheilymenia 

 vinacea is, as in Ciliaria scutellata, not a purely 

 "morphological character" but a physiological one. 

 Aleuria vesiculosa and its Identification. — Aleuria vesiculosa is 

 one of the largest and best known of the Pezizaceae, and from its 

 vesicular ajjpearance, it has been called the Bladdery Peziza ^ and 



13(5. — Cheily- 

 rnenia vinacea. 

 A and C, a 

 fruit-body. B, 

 a ni a r g i n a 1 

 hair. DandE, 

 heliotropically 

 curved asci. F, 

 a paraphysis. 

 A and C, nat. 

 size ; B x 150; 

 D-F X 300. 



^ M. E. Hard, The Mushroom, Edible and Otherwise, Columbus, Ohio, U.S.A., 

 1908, p. 508. 



