44 ^ he Royal Society, London. 



neue Arten gebildet werden können, für welchen Punkt 

 bekanntlich an wild wachsenden Bastarden in letzter Zeit ver- 

 schiedene Anzeichen gefunden worden sind. Doch bedarf d-ese 

 Sache wohl noch zahlreicherer, durch das Experiment gefesti gter 

 Belege. 



24. April 1899. 



Berichte gelehrter Gesellschaften. 



The Royal Society, London, 6/4. 1899. 



Ward, H. Marsliall. 



Onygena equina ( Willd.) a h o r n - d e s t r o y i n g f u n g u s. 



The genus Onygena comprises half a dozen species of fungi, 

 all very imperfectly known, remarkable for their growth on 

 feathers, hair, hörn, hoofs, etc., on which their sporocarps appear 

 S.S drum-stick shaped bodies 5 — 10 mm. high. A cow's hörn, 

 thoroughly infested with the mycelium of the present species, 

 yielded material for the investigation, and the author has not 

 only verified what little was known, but has been able to culti- 

 vate the lungus and trace its lifehistory, neither of which had 

 been done betöre, and to supply some details of its action on 

 the hörn. 



The principal new points concern the developmcnt of the 

 sporophores, which arise as domed or club-shaped masses of hyphae 

 and stand up into the air covered with a glistening white powder. 

 Closer investigation shows this to consist of chlamydospores, formed 

 at the free ends of the up-groAving hyphae. Their details of 

 structure and developmcnt are fully described, and their spore 

 nature proved by culture in hanging drops. The germination, 

 growth into mycelia, and peculiar bioiogy of these hitherto unknown 

 spores were followed in detail, and in some cases new crops of 

 chlamydospores obtained direct in the cultures. 



When the crop of chlamydospores on the outside of the 

 young sporophore is exhausted, the hyphae which bore the spores 

 fuse to form the peridium clothing the head of the sporocarp, and 

 peculiar changcs begin in the internal hyphae bclow. 



Minute tufts or knots of claw-like filaments spring from the 

 hyphae forming the main mass of tiie fungus, push their way in 

 between the latter, and so und room in the mesh-like cavities. 

 Here the closely segmented cUiws form asci — they are the 

 ascogenous hyphae — and the details of dcvelopnu'nt of the asci, 

 their nucleated contents, and the spores are determined. As the 

 spores ripen, the asci, which are extremely evanescent, disappear, 

 and in the ripe sporocarp only spores can be seen lying loose in 

 the meshcs of the gleba. The ascomycctous charactcr of tiie 



