from the Northumberland Coal-field. 223 



particularly their bulbous enlargements, all agree very well 

 with what we observe in these peculiar bodies. But there is 

 one important difference : while, in the unicellular fungi, the 

 tubes never sink deep into the substance in which they are 

 lodged, ramifying immediately below its surface, those of the 

 lenticular bodies, though they are connected with the periphery, 

 permeate the entire mass. Our recent investigations, how- 

 ever, compel us to the conclusion that the whole, including 

 the substance in which the tubes ramify, is but one organism, 

 and that it is a fungus of a peculiar nature, related apparently 

 in structure, and to some extent in form, to Sclerotium stipi- 

 tatuvi, a very curious and abnormal species from India, de- 

 scribed by Messrs. Berkeley and Currey in the '■ Transactions 

 of the Linnean Society ' (1862, vol. xxiii. pp. 91 & 93). The 

 internal structure of this living species is so similar to that of 

 some of the coal-fungi in question, that, were it fossilized, it 

 would assuredly be considered one of them. " The mass con- 

 sists," says the Rev. M. J. Berkeley, " of very irregular, 

 swollen, and sometimes constricted, more or less anastomosing 

 and more or less densely compacted threads." These words 

 might be used to describe the tubes of Archagaricon conglo- 

 meratum, one of our fossil fungi described in the sequel. 



We have in our possession a section of Sclerotium stipi- 

 tatum, and, after carefully examining it, we can find no im- 

 portant difference distinguishing it from sections of our coal- 

 fungi. The irregular character of the tubes, their nodular 

 enlargements, and the large terminal vesicles are all features 

 that are found in both the recent and fossil species. And, 

 moreover, many of the larger "threads " or tubes in Sclerotium 

 stipitatum can be seen abutting with their ends against the 

 dark peripheral cuticle, just as the tubes do in the fossil spe- 

 cies, the bark or cuticle of which is similar in definition and 

 thickness, and is also dark and opaque*. 



On examining sections of these lenticular fungi from the 

 coal-shale, we find that they occasionally appear to be almost, 

 if not entirely, homogeneous, and that, when perfect, they al- 



* Since tlie above was written, we have obtained from Newsham a 

 very interesting specimen of our new fungus, witb the surface in excellent 

 preservation. We bave stated in tlie text that traces of surface-reticu- 

 lation had been observed ; in this new specimen the whole surface is 

 covered with a minute angular reticulation, sharply defined by grooves, 

 and resembling most closely the cuticular reticulation represented in the 

 figures of Sclerotium stipitatum illustrating the paper of Messrs. Berkeley 

 and Currey already referred to ; so that in general form, in this peculiar 

 surface-reticulation, in the thickness and character of the cuticle, and in 

 internal structure our fossil fungi agi-ee with this pecidiar species from 

 India. 



16* 



