197 



only about the wooden floor, but in an open and well-ventilated apartment on the 

 floor above, also around the sash of an adjoining pantry ^vindow, and even on the 

 crevices of the stone division wall outside the house. This latter circumstance was 

 considered a rare occurrence, as wood was always deemed essential to the growth 

 of the Merulius. But in this instance, so rampant was its growth, it seemed to 

 rejoice in its strength, and decline to restrain itself within the usual limits of its 

 prescribed habitat. In fact, I found its long, stringy, and leathery branches 

 spreading in the heart of the two-feet thick rubble wall of the house, built closely 

 mth stone and lime, and extending up the heart of the wall and throughout its 

 thickness for two or three feet from any wood. It was always in its dried-up state 

 however, that I found it in a wall ; and my belief is that it had its mycelium, or 

 root, in wood originally, which had been now exhausted of the qualities necessary 

 to feed the fungus. In the division wall outside it was thought that in the 

 crevices there had been some particles of a ligneous nature for the roots to attach 

 themselves to. In the storey above the ground floor, near the pantry, there was a 

 wooden sink lined with lead, and there it revelled most gloriously, and also about 

 the skirting of the floor immediately beside the sink. There was a window above 

 the sink immediately over the window of the pantry on the ground floor, affected ; 

 in fact the sink, the pantry window, and stone wall between them were literally 

 permeated ^vith the fungus ; and wherever it got light and room to develope, the 

 space was covered with spawn. What was to be done ? I tried first of all cleaning 

 away every trace of fungus, and saturating the wood with carbolic acid, but in a 

 few days it showed itself as luxuriantly as ever. I now resolved to stamp it out, 

 so to speak. I cleaned away the wooden floor, lifted the flag-stones of the passage, 

 removed the wooden window of the pantry, and substituted for it one of zinc ; 

 replaced the wooden cistern case (saw-box) with one of delf, took away every part 

 of the ceiling of the pantry and floor over it, and skirting ; laid the floor of Port- 

 land cement, and supported the joists %vith an iron beam, cut off their connection 

 entirely with the wall, filled up the two or three feet under, where the wooden 

 floor was, with lime and stones, first burning the soil under it, and laid a new floor 

 of cement concrete ; cleaned the outside division, and cemented a large portion of 

 it, and made the partition walls brick. In short, I removed every particle of 

 wood that I thought would be likely to come in contact with earth, pavement, or 

 wall. It is now three years since this was done. I have examined it regularly, 

 and have seen no trace of fungus since ; so that I feel confident I have cured it. 

 I found, in lifting the passage pavement, that wherever a piece of wood, however 

 small, was seen in a soiuewhat healthy state, nuxed with the dibris that had been 

 brought to make up the level, there it had its root, and its growth was spread over 

 the pavement and surface of the earth in beautiful silvery threads. And in other 

 instances, where a very far-gone bit of wood was found, there was either no fungus, 

 or, the wood having been exhausted, the fungus was clinging to it in a dead and 

 dried-up state. 



" From the whole, I draw these conclusions : — 



"1.— That wood is necessary for the root, or first production of the fungus. 



