102 THE WOODLANDS. 



CHAPTER VI. 



FUNGI AND LICHENS. 



ANY visitor of our woodlands in September and 

 October will at once recognise a peculiar kind of 

 vegetation not observable in spring and summer. 

 This peculiarity consists in the large number of fungi 

 with which the ground is sprinkled in all direction s 

 Some people believe that fungi only make their ap- 

 pearance in autumn, because it is only then that they 

 obtrude themselves upon the eye, by reason of the 

 profusion in which they are produced. It is, never- 

 theless, a fact that the class of vegetables known as 

 fungi are being developed all the year round, the 

 larger and more conspicuous kinds being in a great 

 measure autumnal. No one can pass through a 

 moist wood in October without being impressed with 

 the profusion and variety of what are commonly called 

 "toadstools/ 7 growing upon the ground or on old 

 stumps of trees. It is only the student of these obscure 

 plants who really knows the immense variety which 

 our woods produce ; the hundreds of species which 

 make their appearance, flourish for a few weeks, and 

 then disappear, leaving behind scarcely a visible trace 

 of their visitation. No plants depend so much on the 

 character of the season as these ; moisture, combined 



