128 LABORATORY PRACTICE CHAP, xxxiu 



body and examine the fine, dust-like, greenish spores 

 (with the compound microscope, if possible) . 



V. Take fresh specimens of the Common Mushroom (or 

 any Toadstool with gills) which has thoroughly expanded 

 and notice : 



1. The stem or stipe. 



2. The expanded top, the pileus, upon the under side of 



which are found 



3. The gills or lamella, numerous thin plates, colored, and 



radiating from the stipe outward. 



4. Make sketches. 



VI. Removing the stipe, place the pileus, with gills 

 downward upon a piece of white paper and cover with a 

 bell glass or cake cover. After several hours a " spore print" 

 will be found upon the paper resembling the arrangement of 

 the gills. Examine the spores of this print with a lens, 

 or with the compound microscope. Notice the color and 

 minute size of the spores. Make a sketch of the spore print. 



VII. Examine again, or review, the Bread Mould (confer 

 Chapter XIII, VIII), and notice the sporangia and- spores. 



VIII. Our study of spores has necessarily been very slight 

 and fragmentary. We find, however, that they differ from 

 seeds in two principal respects : 



1. Their minuteness. (Of course, some seeds are very small 



for seeds and some spores are very large for spores, 

 yet their very much smaller size will usually distin- 

 guish spores from seeds.) 



2. The fact that the spores are simple practically homoge- 



neous bodies without an embryo. This can be seen 

 under a compound microscope and when the spores 



