364 TEXT-BOOK OF FUNGI 



Rhodosporae, spores salmon-colour or pinkish. Leuco- 

 sporae, spores colourless or tinged yellow. Chlorosporae^ 

 spores pale dull green. 



These sections have evolved in a definite sequence from 

 each other, and each group commences with the most 

 primitive resupinate forms, and passes through the 

 sequence of structure indicated above, until the central- 

 stemmed type is reached. Many of the larger genera show 

 signs of repeating this spore differentiation, and the forma- 

 tion of new genera of groups, as Naucoria in the Ochro- 

 sporae, and Russula and Lepiota in the Leucosporae. 



I have elsewhere, when dealing with CopHnus, shown 

 that this genus, characterised by the gills becoming 

 deliquescent at maturity, is probably the most primitive 

 type of the Agaricaceae, and the starting-point of the 

 sub-family Melanosporae, from which the other sub-families 

 have evolved in the sequence given above. 



Many species included in Coprinus, as C. plicatilis and 

 others, having dry, non-deliquescent gills, have no real 

 affinity with this genus. 



In addition to the evidence afforded by morphology as 

 to the order of appearance of the various sub-families, 

 physiological factors are also in evidence. In the Melano- 

 sporae there is a total absence of those special by-products 

 of metabolism under the form of poisons, which serve as 

 protective agents ; so far as is known, all members of the 

 Melanosporae are edible, or at all events non-poisonous, 

 whereas such substances begin to appear in the other sub- 

 families, and when the Leucosporae are reached, poisonous 

 products are very widely dispersed. A similar sequence is 

 observable in the families of the Hymenomycetes. In the 

 most primitive family, Clavariaceae, poisons are absent, 





