THE MYXOMYCETES. 97 



THE MYXOMYCETES. 



BY \V, B. GROVE B.A., 

 Hon. Sec. Birmingham Natural History and Microscopical Society. 



( Continued from page 77. ) 



DEVELOPMENT OF A SPORE. 



Let US now trace the development of the spore of a typical Myxo- 

 mycetei When one of these is placed in suitable conditions, as in 

 water, it dehisces, and its contents pass out as a transparent, colourless 

 sphere of protoplasm, possessing sometimes a nucleus and a contractile 

 vacuole.* This remains for a time motionless, but soon we can perceive 

 little undulations of its contour, which gradually increase in extent 

 until the shape becomes elongate, and then suddenly thei-e is developed 

 at the end next the nucleus a long flagellum, which flickers gently at 

 first, then more rapidly, and at last attains power enough to move the 

 body from its position. The object then resembles an ordinary free- 

 swimming flagellate monad. After swimming about for a few 

 hours or days it sinks to the bottom of the water, and there 

 creeps about by throwing out pseudopodia, while it still retains 

 its flagellum, and in this state it resembles the Infusoria 

 known as Mastigamoeba and Reptomonas. The flagellum is then 

 absorbed, and the creature becomes extremely similar to an ordinary 

 amoeba. Both in this stage and the preceding it increases by fission, 

 and takes in solid particles of matter, and apparently extracts the 

 nutriment from theni just as an amoeba does. This point seems to be 

 set at rest by the very definite observations that have been made, and 

 is acknowledged by Sachs, who places the Myxomycetes among the 

 Fungi, as much as by Saville Kent, who claims them for the Protozoa, 

 although some mycologists appear to regard the statement as incoiTect.f 

 De Bary and Cieukowski both witnessed the ingestion of solid food. 

 Saville Kent fed his specimens upon carmine, and after a time found 

 the solid particles embedded in the protoplasm, just as we find diatoms 

 in an ordinary amoeba. 



Dksceiption of the Figures in Plate IIa. 

 Pig. l.—Crateriuni pedunculatum, Trent. 

 Fig. •!. — Capillitiuin and spores of the same 

 Fig. 'i.—Trichia falUtx, Pers. 

 Fig. 4. — Elater ami spores of tlie same. 

 Fig. 5.— Diagi-am of portion of elater of the same, to show arrangement of 



spirals. 

 Fig. 6. — a, b, c, e,f, spores of Physarum cine renin, {Ba.tsch.) dehiscing in water ; 



d, less usual form, with the protoplasm divided into two masses. 

 Fig. 7. — Didijmiuni squamulosuin, (A. & S.), var. costatum. 

 .\11 the figures are drawn from nature, except fig. 5, which is diagrammatic. 



* See Plate III., Fig. G. f Grevillea, ix., -13. 



Erratum.— In the previous number, p. 77, the value of fi, micro-millimeter 

 was inadvertently misstated ; it should be jjfaoth of a millinieter. 



