252 



NATURE STUDY 



They are very numerous, both as species and as individ- 

 uals ; perhaps the common toadstool or mushroom is the 

 most likely to be attractive and interesting to children. 



The vegetative organs are quantities of white interlac- 

 ing threads, which penetrate and ramify the decaying 



substance on Avhich the 

 mushroom grows. This 

 is the spawn from which 

 the mushroom is propa- 

 gated by supplying the 

 necessary moisture and 

 heat. There is first pro- 

 duced a round fleshy 

 tubercle, from which is 

 developed a stalk sur- 

 mounted by a round cap, 

 which is covered with a 

 veil. This soon breaks, 

 leaving always a reminder 

 of its former existence and position, in the shape of the 

 ring around the stalk. When it is torn away, there is 

 disclosed underneath the cap many vertical leaves or 

 gills which bear numberless spores, by which the parent 

 plant is again reproduced. 



These plants grow with great rapidity, and the force 

 generated in consequence is most astonishing. 



It is related that a fungus, placed within a glass vessel, 

 expanded so rapidly that the dish was broken into pieces 

 with a noise as loud as the report of a pistol. 



Another famous story is of a paving stone, twenty-one 

 inches square, weighing eight3'--three pounds, raised an 

 inch and a half from its bed by a mass of toadstools, six 

 or seven inches in diameter. 



I IV V 



Story of the Mushroom. 



