504 SEVENTH REPORT—1837. 
of its flowers, and enabling it to bear cold, &c. Hence the im- 
portance of protecting plants without obscuring the light. 
3. Owing to the perfectly quiet condition of the air in these 
cases, plants will bear variations of temperature which under 
ordinary circumstances would prove fatal tothem. Thus I 
have found that many palms, ferns, and numerous Cape and 
Australian plants bear the cold of our climate with impunity, 
while others, when exposed to heat, become surrounded by a 
protecting atmosphere of their own creation, as, for instance, 
the Zrichomanes brevisetum, which has been growing for the 
last three years in a case in my drawing room, fully exposed to 
the south, and in which the thermometer frequently rises to 
100°. A more striking illustration of this may be adduced in a 
case of plants brought by Captain Mallard, from New Holland. 
The plants were inclosed in February, thermometer being 94° 
in the shade. In rounding Cape Horn two months subsequently 
the thermometer fell to 20°; a month after this it rose again to 
100° in the harbour at Rio ; in crossing the line the thermometer 
attained 120°, and fell to 40° on their arrival in the British 
Channel in November, eight months after they were inclosed. 
These plants were taken out in the most healthy condition. 
4. These cases enabling us to surround our plants for an inde- 
finite period, with an atmosphere of any required humidity, we 
are enabled to grow in any situation, even on our study tables, 
a great number of plants, the growth of which has hitherto been 
in great measure confined to their native woods and wilds. To 
notice one instance; I had been struck with the published ac- 
counts of the very rapid growth of some fungi, and particularly 
of Phallus foetidus, which was suid to attain its height of four 
inches in as many hours. I procured three or four specimens in 
an undeveloped state and placed them in a small case. All but 
one grew during my temporary absence from home. I was de- 
termined however not to lose sight of the last, and observing 
one evening that there was a small rent in the volva, indicating 
its approaching development, I watched it all night, and at 
eight in the morning the orifice of the pileus began to push 
through the jelly-like matter with which it was surrounded. In 
the course of 25 minutes it grew three inches, and attained its 
full elevation of four inches in one hour and a half. It can 
hardly be conceived that in this case there was any actual in- | 
crease of matter, but merely an elongation of the erectile tissue 
of the plant. 
I think it is quite needless to point out the various important 
applications of the above facts to the growth of plants in towns, 
their conveyance and growth on ship-board, or the numerous 
