216 



within the circle is barren. These shed their spores and decay, as their 

 parent had done, and thus year by year the circle increases until rings are 

 formed in some cases three feet, and at others thirty yards or more in diame- 

 ter. The turf cut from within the ring exliibits a network of spawn, interlaced 

 amongst the roots of the grass. Thus the fairy palace is demolished, jind the 

 airy dancers dispersed by the hard-hearted and unpoetical mycologist."* 



Berkeley, the great expounder of Fungology in the present day, takes 

 the same view, and after remarking upon the tendency of minute Fungi to 

 "assume a circular disxsosition," he goes on to say : "In the fields we see this 

 tendency illustrated by the formation of Fairy Rings, which have for a long 

 time puzzled philosophers, and are not without their difficulties now. These 

 rings are sometimes of very ancient date, and attain enormous dimensions, so 

 as tp be distinctly visible on a hill-side from a considerable distance. It is 

 believed that they originate from a single Fungus, whose growth renders the 

 soil immediately beneath unfit for its reproduction. The spawn, however, 

 spreads all round, and in the second year produces a crop, whose spawn spreads 

 again, the soil behind forbidding its return in that direction. Thus the cii'cle 

 is continually increased, and extends indefinitely till some cause intervenes to 

 destroy it. If the spawn did not spread on all sides at fii'st, an arc of a circle 

 only is produced. "+ There is some confusion among authors in this theoretical 

 explanation, some saying the spoixs faU in a circular form, while Berkeley gives 

 this power to the mycelium. 



It is extremely easy for a theorist to sit in his easy chair and propound 

 a bold hypothesis, which he fondly hopes may solve a diflSculty and obtain for 

 |iim a reputation ; but if truth is the object in view, it does seem astonishing 

 that people when out iji the country look upon objects with such a careless 

 eye, and wiU not closely examine things before they come to a rash conclusion. 

 Poor Peter Bell, of Wordsworth's imagination, has been often held up to repro- 

 bation, because, like hundreds of the unthinking multitude, — 



" A primrose by the river's brim, 

 A yellow primrose was to him. 

 And nothing more." 



But perhaps the majority of persons in walking through a meadow, if asked about 

 a green circle, or an agaric-fiUed circle there visible, would say — " Ah ! only a, 

 fairy-ring!" and see "nothing more in it," and care nothing more about it 

 than Peter Bell tUd about the primrose ! Even Mr. Berkeley takes the suppo- 

 sition about the single Fungus forming the circle for granted, without due 

 examination himself, and says: — "It is hclici'cd" that such is the case. Now, 

 after attentive observation, I myself do not believe it. No one appears to have 

 tried to make a Fairy Ring on this i^rinciple, and it is clear that if this was 

 the modus operandi, instead of one large circle only, a number of small ciicles 

 would appear intersecting the original one, because if the first fungus could 



* Science Gossij), October 1, 1866. 



t Berkeley's " Outlines of Britisli Fungology," p. 41. 



