CHAPTER XIII. 



ABOUT FUNGI. 



FUNGI are an important class of flowerless plants, 

 belonging to the division called Thallogens, those 

 plants which have no distinction between stem and 

 leaf. They consist wholly of cells, and are distin- 

 guished from other plants by the entire absence of 

 chlorophyll (see Chapter II.) from their cells, which 

 are also devoid of starch. Instead of absorbing car- 

 bon from the atmosphere, as do green plants, they 

 absorb oxygen and give off carbon, in this respect 

 resembling animals. Some of 

 the lower forms were described 

 in Chapter I. ; we shall have 

 occasion again to refer to several 

 of these. 



The Yeast-plant (Toruld] we 

 may take as a type of the fungus 

 cell. Here, in fig. 134, we have 

 FIG. i 34 . enlarged representations of it. 



At A we have a single plant, 



a simple cell, consisting of a cellulose wall (a} and a 

 central mass of protoplasm (), with a clear space or 

 vactiole (c]. In this it does not differ from ordinary 

 vegetable cells, but its difference may be seen on 



