156 JBotan^ 



a magnifying glass, this powdered glass shines like 

 the dust of all manner of jewels, and within the tiny 

 nest lie little spores as eggs lie in a bird's nest. 

 Again water comes to the rescue, dew or rain fills the 

 nests to overflowing, and borne out on the waters go 

 the spores to adhere to some rock surface and expand 

 to other liverworts. Again, instead of such cup-shaped 

 nests full of spores, the upper surface of the liver- 

 wort may produce bags, or flat pockets, or little squat 

 bottles ; whatever it is, it is "filled with spores, and 

 thus acts as a seed-case, while the naked spores per- 

 form the functions of a seed. Such a study of a 

 liverwort, a typical lichen, introduces us to some of 

 the mysteries of lichen life. In it all we are talking 

 about the "infinitely little," but since we have brought 

 our minds to try and conceive of twenty-five or fifty 

 thousand bacteria in line on one inch length of any 

 surface, or liundreds of them easil}^ accommodated 

 side by side on the head of a pin, we can allow our- 

 selves to discourse of liverwort cells, fringes, sacs, 

 pockets, nests, clubs, and whiplashes without flinch- 

 ing. All this is what exists and what we might see 

 if our eyes were strong enough. 



FUNGI. 



While not go abundant as lichens, the fungi are 

 well known everywhere. We cannot claim, as for 



