216 FUNGI. 



able both for its evidence as to the number and character of the 

 spores in the air, and also for the tables showing the relation 

 between five forms of disease, and their fluctuations, as com- 

 pared with the amount of spores floating in the atmosphere. 



We are fain to believe that we have represented the influence 

 of fungi on man as far as evidence seems to warrant. The 

 presence of forms of mould in some of their incipient conditions 

 in different diseased parts of the human body, externally and 

 internally, may be admitted without the assumption that they 

 are in any manner the cause of the diseased tissues, except in 

 such cases as we have indicated. Hospital gangrene may be 

 alluded to in this connection, and it is possible that it may be 

 due to some fungus allied to the crimson spots (blood rain) 

 which occur on decayed vegetation and meat in an incipient 

 stage of decomposition. This fungus was at one time regarded 

 as an algal, at another as animal ; but it is much more probable 

 that it is a low condition of some common mould. The readiness 

 with which the spores of fungi floating in the atmosphere 

 adhere to and establish themselves on all putrid or corrupt sub- 

 stances is manifest in the experience of all who have had to do 

 with the dressing of wounds, and in this case it is a matter of 

 the greatest importance that, as much as possible, atmospherical 

 contact should be avoided. 



Recently a case occurred at the Botanic Gardens at Edin- 

 burgh which was somewhat novel. The assistant to the bota- 

 nical professor was preparing for demonstration some dried 

 specimens of a large puff-ball, filled with the dust-like spores, 

 which he accidentally inhaled, and was for some time confined 

 to his room under medical attendance from the irritation they 

 caused. This would seem to prove that the spores of some 

 fungi are liable, when inhaled in large quantities, to derange 

 the system and become dangerous ; but under usual and natural 

 conditions such spores are not likely to be present in the atmo- 

 sphere in sufficient quantity to cause inconvenience. In the 

 autumn a very large number of basidiospores must be present 

 in the atmosphere of woods, and yet there is no reason to 

 believe that it is more unhealthy to breathe the atmosphere of 



