38 TRANSACTIONS OF THE [Nov. 10, 
may contain large numbers of micrococci, and that these may be 
actually colored green—by a natural process of staining, appa- 
rently unique in nature—by the green coloring matter diffused 
from the fungus through the woody tissue. 
On the other hand, specimens of ‘brightly phosphorescent de- 
cayed wood, recently obtained in the Adirondacks, were found 
to be uniformly uncolored. The cells were turgid with liquid, 
apparently in unusual degree, and contained the mycelium of a 
hymeno-mycetous fungus (as yet not identified), whose hymenia 
were scattered over the exterior surface of the decayed tree. 
The phosphorescent agency, however, was found in vast num- 
bers of a microbe of micrococcous form, mostly spherical, of 
wide variation in size, from 0.2 to 3.0 microns or more in diame- 
ter. ‘These were scattered, or gathered in a variety of groups,. 
diplococci, chains, bunches, étc., and even found sprouting out 
into rods, some of which passed into short articulated hyphe, 
like those constituting the mycelium above referred to. The 
source of these micrococci was shown in larger oval sacs, 9 by 7 
microns in length and breadth, apparently derived from the 
mycelial threads, some being found still filled with the micro- 
cocci of very small size. 
On squeezing the liquid out of the cells of the wood upon thin 
glass covers, the latter were rendered phosphorescent. ‘The or- 
ganism refused to grow upon the ordinary culture media, though 
the fragments of phosphorescent wood could be kept in full 
vigor and brightness for two weeks in a moist chamber. The 
film of micrococci upon the dried thin covers was readily stained 
by campechian (Léffler’s solution). 
The general literature on the phosphorescence of fungi and of 
wood was discussed, froin the papers of Dr. Robert Boyle in the 
year 1667, down to the more recent investigations of Ludwig, 
Fischer, Arcangeli, Patouillard, ete. 
