CRYPTOGAM! A FUNGI. 1 37 



when it is discharged by an irregular rupture in the top. They 

 are in this state called puff-balls, blind-man's buff, or devil's snuff- 

 boxes. The powder is remarkable for its property of strongly 

 repelling moisture. If a basin is filled with water, and a little of 

 the powder strewed upon the surface so as to cover it thinly, the 

 hand may be plunged into it, and thrust down to the bottom 

 without being wetted with a single drop of water. KEITH. The 

 common species have been used in some places of England <f to 

 kill or smolder their bees, when they would drive the hives, and 

 bereave the poor bees of their meat, houses, and lives. They are 

 also used in some places, where neighbours dwell far asunder, to 

 carry and reserve fire from place to place, whereof it tooke the 

 name Lucernarum fungus." GERARDE. For the purpose of tin- 

 der I have seen them used in Northumberland. 



1. L. bovista, " large, obconical, soft, whitish, plicate beneath ; 

 scales broad, often indistinct." 3-4 inches in diameter. GREV. 

 Fl. Edin. 456. HOOK. Scot. ii. 11. L. proteus. Sow. Fung. t. 332, 

 upper figures. 



Hob. Old pastures. Autumn. 



2. L. giganteum, large, globose, white ; membrane double, the 

 outer one smooth, cracking unequally, and falling off. HOOK. 

 Scot. ii. 11. Bovista gigantea, GREV. Fl. Edin. 458. ; Crypt. Fl. 

 t. 336. 



Hob. Old pastures. WALL is mentions it as growing on 

 the hilly pastures at Spindlestone, where I have seen it 

 as large as a man's head, a size much below what it 

 sometimes attains. 



3. L. pratense, " white, soft, hemispherical, subsessile, some- 

 what smooth, warts scattered." Diameter rarely 2 inches. 

 GREV. Fl. Edin. 457. HOOK. Scot. ii. 11. 



Hob. Moorish pastures, common. 



4. L. excipuliforme, white, stalked, somewhat pear-shaped, fur- 

 furaceous and spinous ; spines small, conical. HOOK. Scot. ii. 11. 

 GREV. Fl. Edin. 457. L. proteus, Sow. Fung t. 332, lower figures. 

 BOLT. Fung. t. 117- f. 9. 



flab. Woods in autumn, not uncommon. 



