TRANSACTIONS OF THE ILLINOIS 



„ice, of St. Louis, being called upon, spoke at length on 



i, in their relation to vegetable disease. 



Flagg — I offer the following : 



Resolved, That Mr. Tice be requested to put his remarks in 

 writing, with such additions as he may see fit, for publication in 

 the Transactions of the Society. Carried. 



The following are the remarks of Mr. Tice as written out in ac- 

 cordance with the resolution. 



FUNGI. 



Mr. President: — This call to address this convention takes me by surprise, and places 

 me in an embarrassing situation. I came here to listen, not to talk, to learn, not to in- 

 struct. I especially came here to hear the discussion of another subject, climatology, in 

 which I take a great interest, but it was not my intention to say anything on that, 

 even though I have to some extent made it my study ; much less did I expect to say 

 anything on fungi, of which I have no definite knowledge. My friend Mr. Earle, who 

 made the motion, saw fit to compliment me as one that was thoroughly master of the 

 subject. This is another source of embarrassment. I am afraid it has raised expecta- 

 tions, which will not be realized. Therefore before I proceed, I will disabuse your minds 

 and tell you truly and frankly, I have not even mastered the alphabet of micology. 

 True, I have for some years made microscopic observations of the different fungi that 

 rot our cereals and-fruits, and have had the pleasure of an intimate acquaintance with 

 that enthusiastic micologist and microscopist Prof. Hilgard, who has taken the trouble 

 to exhibit to me the results of his labors in a general investigation of fungi. This is the 

 extent of my knowledge on this subject. 



But the first question is, what is a fungus ? Botanists have divided the vegetable king- 

 dom into two great divisions, the phaenogamia and the cryptogamia. The first are flow- 

 ering plants, the latter are flowerless. Phaeuogams propagate themselves by producing 

 seeds ; cryptogams by producing spores, or as they are termed in Latin, sporangia. In 

 Dr. Hull's Report, and in the essay of Prof. Turner, cryptogamia is used as the synonym 

 of fungi. I find it also so used by the gentlemen now investigating the Texas cattle dis- 

 ease. This is not scientifically correct. The division cryptogamia includes the mosses, 

 ferns, algaj or sea-weeds, and fungi or mushrooms. When we therefore, use a term so 

 comprehensive as to include the tree-like ferns of the tropics, as well as the microscopic 

 mushrooms, there is a liability to be misunderstood. I shall therefore use the word fun- 

 gus or its Latin j>\urn\ fungi, to designate the particular order of cryptogamous plants I 

 am speaking of. 



In what, then, does a fungus differ from from all other plants ? It differs essentially 

 in the function it performs in the vegetable kingdom. Pluenogamous plants as growers, 

 are deoxygenators, that is, they decompose both water and carbonic acid, liberating the 

 oxygen and building up or composing vegetable tissue and other organic products out 

 of the obtained hydrogen and carbon. On the contrary, fungi as growers, are oxygena- 

 tors, that is, they decompose all organic substances and reduce them Jto inorganic mat- 

 ter. Phcenogams and all plants that feed on inorganic matter, therefore stand between 



