"French National Insl'ilnlc. 357 



rlcs, the points oTthe hydnje, &c., are covered at certain 

 periods with a multitude of small grains, or powakr; other 

 genera, like the lycoperdons, have their interior filled with 

 this powder, and squirt it out at the period of ripeness. These 

 grains are regarded as the seeds, or as their capsules ; at le.5sf, 

 this is the opinion of ail botanists who think that mushrooms 

 have seeds. M. de Beanvois maintains, on the contrary, 

 that this is the pollen, and says that the seeds are in the in- 

 terior of the laminse or of the points, or rather in sonic other 

 part of the texture, and that ihey have hitherto escaped the 

 eyes of his predecessors because they are almoit invisible. 

 It is therefore at the moment of the explosion, and coniie- 

 quently when they are already developed, that he thinks the 

 grains of the lycoperdons, as well as those of the niossc,;, 

 are fecundated. 



Such is the svstem according to which M. de Beauvois 

 thinks himself authorised to erase the name of Cryptogamiaf 

 or of hidden fnicl'ification, given by Linua?us, and also pre- 

 served by Hedwig, to these different families, and to sub- 

 stitute the na.mQ oi ALlheogmnia, or plants of an unusual 

 er exiraordiuary fruclifLcation. 



He has published one part of his Prodromiis of JEiheo- 

 gamy, a pamphlet in which he announces the distribution 

 he establishes among the mosses ; he has separated in the 

 formation of the genera what llcdwig lakes for tlie orgau$ 

 of the male sex ; a precaution so far proper, ns the func- 

 tions of these parts are not yet beyond controversy ; and he 

 Hses the same caution, although in opposition to himseli', 

 by not giving any account of this cohnnella, whieii lie 

 takes for the pistil. Nevertheless, it is according to the or- 

 gans of the sexes that he separates in this sairie prodromus 

 the lycopod(C of the common mosses ; but this is because he 

 thinks tlicre remains no doubt with respect to the former, 

 at least in son>e genera. 



In a second part, still in manuscript, but read to the 

 class, M. dc Bcauvois presents his distribution of mu.^h- 

 rooms and of the algce. In the former he has made some 

 changes in the distribution of Persoon, and he reduces the 



number 

 S 



