REPRODUCTION IN COPRIStJS RADIATUS. 65 



themselves, or from the protoplasmic filaments which they throw 

 out. I am therefore disposed to believe that the absence of sexual 

 organs on tlie mycelium is owing to the threads being the produce 

 of fertilisation. 



As for the expressed juice of horse-dung, it abounds with nema- 

 toid worms, spores, and infusoria of many kinds — no drop can be 

 examined from a dung-heap after a shower of rain without seeing 

 large quantities of these organisms. Therefore, any uncertain 

 thread taken for examination from dung is sure to lead to error. 

 All my experiments were carried out in duplicate, one with ex- 

 pressed juice and the other with distilled water, with very little 

 difference in result, as the new plant seemed to live principally on 

 the remains of the old parent. 



As a proof of how much there is still to be learnt respecting the 

 life history of Agarics, I may say that in Sach's recently published 

 Ttxt Book of Botany, one of the very best and most complete 

 books of its class ever published, there is no mention whatever made 

 of cystidia in the description of Agaricus, and in La Maout and 

 Decaisne's Descriptive and Anali/tical Botant/, under fungi, it is stated 

 that the male organs never produce antherozoids, and that the 

 cystidia are always deprived of sterigmata or spicules. 



To repeat and follow out these observations it is necessary to take 

 the specimens for examination exactly at the proper period of 

 growth, and to exercise the greatest care in securing an uniform 

 moisture between the glasses. The life of the fungus is so short, 

 and all the characters are so evanescent, that the points to be 

 observed may be present one moment and all gone the next. 



All the drawings have been made with a camera-lucida, and from 

 different specimens, so where the dimensions of the parts slightly 

 disagree, it is only such a disagreement (within defined limits) as is 

 commonly found in Nature. 



Eehm's Ascomyceten. — The sixth fasciculus of these specimens 

 has just been received and contains, as usual, several new or other- 

 wise interesting species. Any critical remarks must be postponed 

 until we have had an opportunity of examining more minutely. 

 It is, however, but justice to remark, that for size and quality of 

 specimens this collection stands unequalled by any which have 

 ever been issued in any country, although sometimes not in quite 

 so convenient a form for the herbarium ; this, however, is a fault 

 which can be remedied by transferring the specimens to flatter 

 boxes. 



