156 TIMBER AND SOME OF ITS DISEASES. [CHAP. 



series of dark shining strings, looking almost like the 

 purple-black leaf-stalks of the maidenhair fern, and 



FIG. 15. A small group of Agaricus (Armillaria) melleus. The toad-stool is 

 tawny-yellow, and produces white spores ; the gills are decurrent, and the stem 

 bears a ring. The fine hair-like appendages on the pileus should be bolder. 



these strings branch and meander in the wood of the 

 tree, and in the soil, and may attain even great 



