ON REPRODUCTION IN FUNGI. 139 



innumerable spermatia. These corpuscles, enveloped as they are in 

 mucilage, issue from their conceptacle under the form of a long 

 tendril, and each of them, taken separately, is only *003 m.m. long. 

 There is no appearance as if these spermatophorous appliances were 

 ever transformed, as has been thought, into cyathiform organs pro- 

 vided with theca?. Such organs are habitually rarer in Tympania 

 conspersa than the spermogonia ; they are especially developed 

 around the sori formed by the latter, and an infinitude of extremely 

 fine spores are observed in each theca. 



The spermoginia of Cenangium ligni (Desm.), a fungus barely 

 differing from the true Peziza, are very small punctiform perithecia 

 easy to confound with the young cups, and the simple cavity of which 

 encloses an infinitude of straight spermatia which are not more than 

 •0035 in. long. 



Other Cenangia offer commonly only pycnidia, and ascophorous 

 cups. The pycnidia of Cenangium fuliginosum are a kind of not 

 very regular and unilocular tubercles ; they have a more symmetrical 

 form in Cenangium Aria?, and Cenangium Padi, and also contain 

 arched-lanceolate stylospores, from 15 to 20 thousandths of a 

 millim. in length. Those of Cenangium Cerasi and Cenangium 

 Prunastri are frequently narrow and elongated in the manner of 

 tubes ; they are joined at their bases, and their cavities communi- 

 cate with each other ; we find very large linear-lanceolate and 

 flexuous stylospores. Cenangium Bibis possesses on the other 

 hand globular substipitate pycnidia, agglomerated on a thick sub- 

 iculum, and their compact mass is divided by a network of coloured 

 partitions into a multitude of compartments in which innumerable 

 ovoid, and very small stylospores take their rise. 



The Cenangium Fraxini and Cenangium Fran gu la? deserve a special 

 mention, for they possess, more than their legitimate congeners do, 

 spermatia. In the first these corpuscles, which are curved and 

 about -01 mm. in length, are developed either in small special ovoid 

 processes, or in the cavity of the pycnidia towards their orifice, but 

 in the latter case they are perfectly distinguishable from the stylo- 

 spores, which are similarly arched, but relatively very voluminous. 

 The spermatia of Cenangium Franguhv are straight, from three to 

 five thousandths of a millim. long, and fill the orifice of some of the 

 young cups, while they are still almost closed, and their lmnenium 

 seems to be formed of similar elements. On the other hand, the 

 pycnidia of the same fungus, which resemble the perithecia of 

 Sphceria, habitually produce no spermatia. 



In several Dermatea? stylospores and spermatia co-exist. Ac- 

 cording to what takes place in the fungi already quoted, these two 

 kinds of reproductive corpuscles are disseminated before the appear- 

 ance of the ascophorous cups, but they are here generated together 

 on a stroma, which has no proper tegument. This subiculum much 

 resembles a Tubercularia in Dermatea carpinea ; it is less well 

 defined, of less consistence, and sometimes locellate in Dermatea 



