356 DIVISION III. — MODE OF LIFE OF THE FUNGI. 



2. NUTRITIVE ADAPTATION. 



Sf.ction XCIX. Fungi have long been divided into two main sections founded 

 on their nutritive adaptation Those which constitute the first category feed on living 

 organisms whether plants or animals, and are termed parasites. Their relationship 

 with their hosts is that of a common life, a symbiosis. The others inhabit decaying 

 bodies and feed on dead organic substances, and have been named therefore since 1866 

 saprophytes. The two kinds of adaptation arc sharply distinguished from one another 

 till we come to cases in which it may be doubtful whether a body should be said to be 

 alive or dead, but with these we are not further concerned ; both are distributed 

 unequally amongst the different species, and are developed in varying degrees in 

 different individuals with many intermediate gradations. The extreme cases and the 

 first to be distinguished are species of purely and strictly saprophytic and species of 

 strictly parasitic mode of life. Others lie between these two extremes ; there may be 

 firstly species which both can and do normally go through the whole course of their 

 development as saprophytes, but which have also the power of going through their 

 course of development wholly or in part as parasites ; these may be called with Van 

 Tieghem facultative parasites. Secondly, species which, as far as we know, do as a 

 rule go through the whole course of their development as parasites, but at the same 

 time are able, at least in certain stages, to vegetate as saprophytes : these may be 

 termed facultative saprophytes. As far as we fully and certainly know, the parasitic 

 mode of life is always indispensable to the complete development of this second kind. 

 Keeping in view the latter circumstance we obtain the following grouping according to 

 the life-condition : 1. Pure saprophytes. 2. Facultative parasites. 3. Obligate 

 parasites, that is, species to which a parasitic life is indispensable for the attainment 

 of their full development. The latter are again divided into (a) strictly obligate 

 parasites, that is, species which, as far as we know, live only as parasites, and (b) 

 facultative saprophytes. Most species in category 2 may be able to attain their full 

 development in both modes of life. It is at present uncertain whether there are 

 transitional forms between them and 3 (b), parasitism being the rule in some species, 

 but the full development being possible in exceptional cases in a saprophytic mode of 

 life ; the many gradations between them of other kinds make it not improbable. 



In presence of these gradations the foregoing division can only be a frame, such 

 as is necessary for obtaining a clear survey of the phenomena, and it should be 

 distinctly observed that it has in view the ascertained adaptations and arrangements 

 which hold good in the natural, and, as we are accustomed to say, the spontaneous 

 course of things. There may be possibilities of existence in a species which 

 transcend these adaptations. Artificial conditions may in some cases be established 

 which may result, for example, in the development of a spontaneously and strictly 

 parasitic Fungus in a way not parasitic, just as it is possible to rear normal bean or 

 maize-plants by water-culture. We can conceive such a possibility in every case, 

 even in much more difficult cases than any which occur in this work, such for instance 

 as those of trichinae and tape-worms. It must also be allowed that plants cultivated 

 under artificial conditions of such a kind may be of the greatest help to the under- 

 standing of the phenomena. How far a state of things produced for the purpose of 



