Miscellaneous. 4A\ 



fungal fruit fecundated by copulation in Agarims campestris and A. 

 vaginatus, and at the same time demonstrated that the fruit of the 

 Basidiomycetse (just like those of the Lichens which .contain their 

 seeds in tubes [Cfenof/onnmi], to which, according to recent obser- 

 vations, the Ascomycetae approach, as indeed had been anticipated 

 by me *) is the product of an act of copulation of two heterogeneous 

 ceUs ; and therefore it might justly be required of any one who 

 was inclined to regard a stage in the development of a fungus, in 

 opposition to the opinion of its discoverer who occupies a high 

 scientific position, not as a gonidial, but as a fruit-form, that he 

 should prove that the developmental form in question was the pro- 

 duct of a process of fecundation, or, at least, that he should en- 

 deavour to render the evidence of this as little doubtful as possible. 

 The necessity of this proof was not thought of by Woronin, who 

 rather considered the basidial form of the gonidiophores sufficient 

 to enable him to form a judgment as to the nature of the fungal 

 organization in question. 



As, however, the form of the gonidia is so variable in the Fungi, 

 and in part simulates the fruit- 'and seed-formation in the Asco- 

 mycetae and Hymenomycetae, nothing can be ascertained from it as 

 to the position of the species to which it belongs. This conviction 

 induced me to make a fresh investigation of this fungus, which is 

 widely diffused in the pine-forests of North Germany upon Vaccinium 

 Vitis Idcea, and occurs near Berlin from May to September. 



On the mycelium of the fungus growing in the leaf-tissue of the 

 Vaccinium, I was unable to detect the presence of any copulatory 

 organs ; but it does not follow that I may not have overlooked them, 

 and therefore this can be no proof that no act of copulation takes 

 place upon it. On the other hand, I observed, in the gonidia de- 

 scribed by Fuckel and Woronin, developmental phenomena which 

 are by no means in favour of these being the seeds of a Basidiomy- 

 cetan, as Woronin asserts when he describes their supports as the 

 basidia of a Hymenomycetan. 



I found that the gonidia, which with very rare exceptions occur 

 in fours upon the summit of thick cylindrical branch-cells of the 

 mycelium, and are supported upon short, thick, bristly peduncles, 

 frequently become cellular, both when they remain upon their sup- 

 ports and can become further developed, and after being shaken off 

 or withered. This is effected, in the first place, by the extension 

 of two nuclear cells contained in them (and already observed by 

 Woronin) until they touch each other in the middle of their mother 

 cell, when they form a transverse septum ; then in each of these 

 two daughter cells two hew cells are again produced in the same way, 

 and extend themselves until two new transverse septa are again 

 produced; at the same time the mother ceU (the original gonidium), 

 which was at first bent and somewhat inclined outwards, becomes 

 slightly increased in size, acquires a more cylindrical form, and erects 

 itself, so that all the four cells form a longitudinally divided cylin- 



* Gesammelte Beitrage zur Anatomie und Physiologie der Pflanze, p. 341 ; 

 Das Geschlechtsleben der Pflanze und die Parthenogenesis, 1860. 

 Ann. & Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 4. Vol. iv. 32 



