18 Reproduction in the Mushroom Tribe. By W. G. Smith. 



appreciation of the exact form and gyrations of the spermatozoids 

 they are shown again at the bottom of Fig. 5, enlarged 3000 

 diameters. At first it requires long and patient observation to 

 make out the form of these bodies satisfactorily, but when the 

 peculiar shape is once comprehended there is little difficulty in 

 correctly seeing their characteristic form. The difficulty is some- 

 thing like that experienced by beginners in separating very small 

 and close double stars with a telescope ; at first and sometimes for 

 a long period only one star can be seen, till quite suddenly the two 

 are made out, and they are seen as two ever afterwards. 



It is not uncommon to find the spores of other dung-borne fungi 

 sticking to the specimens of C. radiatus, and it is quite frequent to 

 find not only the spores but the perfect asci of certain species of 

 Ascobolus sticking to the under surface, to which position they 

 have been projected from the plants of Ascobolus growing on the 

 dung. I have also seen the eggs of various mites, nematoid worms, 

 &c., carried up amongst the cells, which quite accounts for larvae 

 being found within the substance of apparently sound fungi. 



In the works I am acquainted with there is no mention of the 

 cystidia falling bodily out of the hymenium on to the ground, yet 

 this is the case in several Agarics I have examined, and is so with 

 C. radiatus. The spores naturally fall to the earth, and with them 

 the cystidia, and it is upon the moist earth that fertilization is 

 generally carried out. All botanists will remember Hoffmann's 

 observations, where he has indicated the passage of basidia into 

 cystidia, and his remarks on the upper surface of the ring which 

 grows round the middle of the stem in Agaricus muscarius. In this 

 latter position Hoffmann found a quantity of gelatinous knots, from 

 which projected one or more oscillating threads, terminated fre- 

 quently with a little head, which occasionally becomes detached. 

 My interpretation of these observations is, that Hoffmann lighted 

 upon the fallen cystidia on the upper surface of the ring, where 

 they were throwing out threads. Hedwig made somewhat similar 

 observations on the ring in Agaricus. 



From the condition of the infant plant, as figured on the hyme- 

 nium, Fig. 3, Z, and Fig 5, C, it is easy to trace the young fungus 

 through the various stages of its growth, as seen at Fig. 6, where 

 the figures are all enlarged 500 diameters ; the lower group of cells 

 shows a plant of seven days' growth in the expressed juice of 

 horse-dung. In all these figures it will be seen that crystals and 

 spores are carried up by the cells, and the lower figure conclusively 

 shows that the first cells of the new plant are the large ones which 

 belong to the pileus ; indeed the hairs of the pileus as here shown 

 are amongst the earliest cells produced, these hairs and the threads 

 of the mycelium (which is always highly granular near the plant) 

 are almost one and the same in character. In Fier. C and 



