COPRINUS MICACEUS 



345 



same general significance as the dimorphism of the basidia of Co- 

 prinus comatus, C. sterquilinus, and C. atramentarius. The spores 

 on any small area of the hymenium, such as that represented in 

 Fig. 153, A and B (p. 343), must all be ripe and ready for discharge 

 at approximately one and the same time ; for the zone of spore- 

 discharge passes upwards across it and leaves it bare of spores in 





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Fig. 154. — Coprinus micaceus. Analysis of the hymenium. The four 

 generations of spores shown at B in Fig. 153 have been set out separ- 

 ately. A, B, C, and D show the spores of the basidia of the first, second, 

 third, and fourth generations respectively. The shading of the spores 

 is exactly the same as in Fig. 153, B. Magnification, 293. 



the course of not very many minutes, while thereafter it is soon 

 destroyed by autodigestion. Under these conditions more basidia, 

 and therefore more spores, can be produced on any small area of the 

 hymenium when the basidia are tetramorphic than when they are 

 monomorphic. If all the spores shown in Fig. 153 at A had been 

 produced upon equally high monomorphic basidia, during the pro- 

 duction and discharge of the spores there would have been much 

 jostling and disturbance. But the spores in question were produced 

 on tetramorphic basidia, each set of basidia bearing its spores at a 



