208 ROMANCE OF LOW LIFE AMONGST PLANTS. 



the filaments can only grow in the presence of 

 moisture. Cut off the supply of moisture and 

 exhaust all that is present, and fungus growth is 

 conquered. The presence of dry-rot is evidence in 

 itself of the existence of superabundant moisture. 

 No one Avho has experienced the potency of dry-rot 

 in cellars, of mildew on damp linen, or of mould on 

 jams and fruits, will dispute our claim to place fungi 

 above all other vegetable organisms as entitled to 

 the epithet of " The Destroyer." 



Luminous Agarics. 

 There are many references in books of travel to 

 luminous agarics, which have been observed in 

 different parts of the world, so that the phenomenon 

 itself can no longer be open to doubt, whatever un- 

 certainty there may be as to its proximate cause. 

 Up to this time the largest number of described 

 species, with a phosphorescent property, have been 

 found in the Australasian colonies. Dr. Bennett 

 alluded more than thirty years ago to their occur- 

 rence, or, at the least, to one species which had come 

 under his observation. " It is very common," he 

 says, " in the Australian woods, in the vicinity of 

 Sydney, about the localities of the South Head 

 Road, and among the scrubs and forests on the 

 approach to the headlands of Botany Bay, and emits 

 a light sufficiently powerful to enable the time on 

 a watch to be seen by it. The effect produced by 

 it upon the traveller when, on a dark night, he comes 

 suddenly upon it glowing in the woods is startling, 

 for to a person unacquainted with this phenomenon 



