380 CRYPTOGAMIA. 



species as regularly as any other organized beings, 

 though, like others, subject to varieties. Their se- 

 questered and obscure habitations, their short du- 

 ration, their mutability of form and substance, ren- 

 der them indeed more difficult of investigation than 

 common plants, but there is no reason to suppose 

 them less perfect, or less accurately defined. Splen- 

 did and accurate works, illustrative of this Order, 

 have been given to the world by Schaeffer, Bulliard 

 and Sowerby, which are the more useful, as the 

 generality of fungi cannot well be preserved. The 

 most distinguished writer upon them, indeed the 

 only good systematic one, is Persoon, who has 

 moreover supplied us with some exquisite figures. 

 His Synopsis Methodica Fungorum helps us to the 

 following arrangement. 



1. Angiocarpi, such as bear seeds internally. 

 These are either hard, like Sph&ria, Sower b. Fung. 

 t. 159, 160 ; or membranous, tough and leathery, 

 like Lycopcrdon, t. 33 1 , 332 ; Cyathus(Nidularid) 

 t. 28, 29 ; or Batarrea (Lycoperdoii) t. 390. 



2. Gymnocarpi, such as bear seeds imbedded in 

 an appropriate, dilated, exposed membrane, deno- 

 minated hymenium, like Helvetia, t. 39, in which 

 that part is smooth and even ; Boletus, t. 34, 87, 

 134, in which it is porous; and the vast genus 

 Agaricus, t. 1,2, &c., in which it consists of pa- 

 rallel plates called lamella, or gills. 



Persoon has been commendably sparing of new 



