THE PLICATILIS SUB TYPE 35 



little way downwards so as to surround the upper part of the stipe 

 with a short sheath, the lower margin of which is bounded by a 

 collar made up of the inner ends of the gills. Shortly before spore- 

 discharge begins, the sheath of flesh grows in such a manner that 

 its rim moves outwards away from the stipe and upwards ; and 



Fig 21. — Coprinus pUcatilis. A group of frviit-bodies coming up 

 amid grass near London, England. The largest fruit-body is 

 fully expanded : the disc is broad and characteristically 

 depressed, and the radial sulcations are due to the partial 

 splitting of the gills from above downwards along their median 

 planes. Photographed by Somerville Hastings. Natural size. 



it is this movement of the pileus-flesh which causes the expansion 

 of the pileus as a whole. 



(8) Autodigestion does not take place, so that the spore-freed 

 portions of the gills are not destroyed from below upwards. This 

 negative feature serves to distinguish the Plicatilis Sub-type from 

 all the other Coprinus Sub-types. 



Representative Species. — At present I am acquainted with only 

 one species of fungus having the Plicatilis Sub-type organisation, 

 and that is Coprinus plicatilis itself. This species, in possessing 

 non-autodigesting (non-deliquescent) gills, appears to be unique 

 so far as the genus Coprinus is concerned. 



