CHAPTEE XXV 



SLIME FUNGI :\rYXOMYCETES 



The Myxomycetes, or Myxogasters, are an extraordinary group, 

 which have been the subject of much discussion, on account of 

 some peculiar features which characterise them, and separate 

 them from Fungi generally, and all other of the Cryptogamia. 

 On this account some have advocated their exclusion from the 

 vegetable kingdom altogether, whilst zoologists have been in 

 no hurry to accept them. The common error of accepting 

 analogy for affinity is one which even scientific minds are 

 occasionally betrayed into committing, and yet, apparently, 

 unconscious of their own failing. We liave, during a period 

 of half a century, seen several hypotheses started on similar 

 unstable bases, flourish awhile, and then come to nought. For 

 a long time, and up to a very recent date, the Myxogasters 

 were classed with the Trichogasters, as two groups of the order 

 of Gasteromycetes. Without a knowledge of their life-history, 

 and but little of their microscopical structure, this assumed 

 alliance was a natural one, but it has come to be renounced. 

 It was only in 1864 that the position was assailed by De Bary, 

 who changed the name to Mycetozoa, and claimed for them a 

 position as nearly related to the animal as the vegetable world. 

 " I have," he says, " placed the Myxomycetes, under the name 

 of Mycetozoa, outside the limits of the vegetable kingdom, and 

 I still consider this to be their true position." Strangely 

 enough, however, in all his subsequent botanical works, he 

 continues to include the Mycetozoa, as if he lacked the courage 

 of his opinions; and other botanical writers and compilers of 

 text-books have continued the same course. In this group the 

 two stages or phases of life, the vegetative and the reproductive. 



