NATUUE OF FUNGI. 40 



if kinds not hitherto detected present themselves^ they are 

 either such as are well known in other districts, or species 

 which have been overlooked, and which are found on better 

 experience to be widely diffused. There is nothing like chance 

 about their characters or growth. It is quite astonishing how 

 few new species have been met with in Sweden since the pub- 

 lication of the 'Epicrisis' of Fries in 1838, though acute bo- 

 tanists have studied them most accurately in the course of 

 the last twenty years, and especial attention has been lately 

 paid to them with a view to making as complete a collection 

 as possible of drawings of the fleshy or softer Fungi for the 

 Museum at Stockholm, and of the few novelties which have 

 turned up, some have already occurred elsewhere.'^ 



It is therefore almost useless to advert to the third notion, 

 though a very common one, which would regard these pro- 

 ductions as the creatures of chance, or of a happy concurrence 

 of circumstances favourable to their growth from inorganic 

 elements. It is true that they often occur in unexpected 

 situations, and from their extreme rapidity of development, 

 sometimes seem as if they could not have originated from 

 anything like seed ; but as accurate inquiries have now thrown 

 light upon much of the mystery in which the origin of intes- 

 tinal worms was but lately involved, so the phenomena which 

 attend the growth of Fungi arc gradually receiving light, and 

 they are found to follow essentially the same laws as more 

 perfect vegetables. 



The notion of equivocal or spontaneous generation, indeed, 

 is now all but exploded amongst scientific men. The most 

 careful experiments show that, without pre-existent germs, 



* Copies of many of these drawings have been forwarded to me by the kind- 

 ness of Fries, and from these I have ah-eady been enabled to recognize one of 

 the very few new species {Agaricus gliodermus) as British. 



