STRICKLAND: NOTES ON FUNGI. 1 89 



divided into sub-groups according to the colour of their spores, 

 which is constant for these several sub-groups ; and what can more 

 strikingly define a species than the verdigris-green of Peziza aeruginosa? 

 Nature, however, when studied in her living self, is apt to deal 

 out sharp blows to our species-making. Thus, for example, when 

 looking up the minute Peziza; I came upon a piece of rotten wood, 

 stained black in some places by the mycelium of some Valsa or 

 Diatrype. Over th ; s piece of wood a family of Pezizse had spread 

 itself. They were obviously one and the same family, but where the 

 wood was stained black they grew as Peziza cinerea, where it was not 

 so stained they were Peziza cerea, or some other white-cupped Peziza. 

 To make the certainty of the specific unity of the family quite com- 

 plete, the Pezizae which grew half on the black-stained, half on the 

 unstained wood had cups one-half of which was one species and 

 one-half the other; Peziza cinerea on the black, Peziza cerea on the 

 unstained, portion of the host. Here the influence of the host in 

 forming the species or variety of the parasite seems to be pretty well 

 demonstrated ; although we see at the same time from this example 

 how arbitrary some of the specific distinctions we make in our classifi- 

 cations often really are. 



In the above remarks on the difficulties of specific identification, 

 I have indirectly pointed out how many problems of great and general 

 interest have yet to be solved in connection with the life-history of 

 our native fungi. These problems can only be solved by going 

 direct to nature, by watching her in her living moods, by delineating 

 accurately what has been observed, and by noting surrounding con- 

 ditions with the like accuracy. A comparison of the sketches of the 

 fructification of a few common Sphaeria growing in their native haunts 

 by a large number of observers, noting accurately the conditions 

 under which the fungi were found, the season of the year, the hosts 

 they grew upon, etc., might produce wholly unexpected results, and 

 some clear idea might be obtained as to (i) how far our army of 

 species are true species, (2) whether they are in some cases tempo- 

 rarily modified by the hosts they grow upon, and (3) how far the 

 peculiar forms of species are due (a) to inheritance, (b) to the direct 

 action of mechanical forces, and {c) to the nature of the hosts they 

 grow upon. 



It is in the hope that these desultory remarks may induce some 

 of my readers to devote their leisure hours to interrogating nature 

 on these points that I have set them down, persuaded that systematic 

 observations and systematic sketches of fructification, and especially 

 of abnormal forms, will materially contribute to the solution of 

 many of the unguessed riddles connected with cryptogamic botany. 



June 1889. 



