CHAPTER XIX 



THE COPRINUS TYPE OF FRUIT-BODY 



" And agarics and fungi with mildew and mould 

 Started like mist from the wet ground cold ; 

 Pale, fleshy, as if the decaying dead 

 With a spirit of growth had been animated ! 



Their moss rotted off them, flake by flake, 

 Till the thick stalk stuck like a murderer's stake, 

 Where rags of loose flesh yet tremble on high, 

 Infecting the winds that wander by." 



SHELLEY. 1 



THE Coprini are especially characterised by the fact that the gills 

 " deliquesce " on maturity, and that drops of an inky -looking fluid 

 are often formed on the pilei. So far as I am aware, however, 

 although many figures and photographs 2 of members of the 

 Coprinus genus have been published, no one hitherto has ex- 

 plained the real significance of the fact of " deliquescence " or the 

 general structural arrangement of Coprinus fruit-bodies. In what 

 follows, I hope to be able to show how admirably a Coprinus 

 fruit-body is constructed when regarded as a highly efficient 

 spore-producing and spore-liberating organ. 



One of the best known and largest of the Coprini is Coprinus 

 comatus. It often comes up in great abundance in fields 

 (Plate IV., Fig. 21). It "deliquesces" in a typical manner. 

 Fruit-bodies of this species afforded me admirable material for a 

 study of the structure of a Coprinus in relation to spore-fall. 



1 The second of these two verses evidently refers to a species of Coprinus. 

 The poet had probably noticed the remarkable changes which take place in the 

 conspicuous fruit-bodies of Coprinus comatus. 



2 A series of excellent photographs of this species has been published by 

 G. F. Atkinson, " Studies and Illustrations of Mushrooms : II.," Bull. 168, Cornell 

 Univers. Agric. Experiment Station, 1899; also, Mushrooms Edible, Poisonous, dr., 

 Ithaca, 1901, pp. 33-41. 



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