150 ABOUT MOSSES AND LICHENS. [CHAP. 
were it not that, quite recently, we read in an ele- 
mentary botany, intended for use in schools, that 
“Lichens are true Fungi; they are found preying 
upon families of Algz.... When the Alge are freed 
from the Fungi which imprisoned them, their growth 
proceeds; but the Fungi cannot live without the 
Algz nourishing them.” Nothing could be more 
absurd than the notion of teaching children as facts 
that which has been termed “sensational romance” 
by every well-known practical fungologist and lichen- 
ologist. The enquiring reader who is curious to know 
what has been said of this theory, vo and con, should 
see an article by the Rev. J. M. Crombie in the “Popu- 
lar Science Review,” July 
1874, also one by Mr. 
W. Archer in “ Quarterly 
Journal of Microscopical 
Science,” vol. xiii. p. 217. 
What we have in the 
Liverworts termeda frond, 
in the Lichens is known 
as a thallus. Fig. 113 is a transverse action of a 
thallus, or, rather, a portion of a thallus surmounted 
by an apothecium (Ap). This latter is analogous to 
the archegonium in certain other plants considered in 
the present Chapter. It contains a large number of 
sporangia embedded in it (Sf). Other organs analo- 
gous to antheridia are found embedded in the thallus, 
and opening on the surface by pores. They contain 
little filamentous bodies, the Spermazza, like anthero- 
zoids. Fig. 114 represents a lichen popularly known 
as the Cup-moss (Cenomyce pyxidata). 
Fic. 113. 
