i68 



SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



these brilliant light-givers flitting about and 

 resting on the foliage, slowly moving and inter- 

 crossing in the air, as they fly from tree to tree. 

 In South America the fire-flies are frequently used 

 for personal adornment, and when fastened to a 

 lady's dress by means of a fine wire, give it the 

 appearance of being bespangled with costly jewels. 

 So steady and brilliant is the light produced by 

 these insects, that clusters of them are used by the 

 Indians, when travelling at night, to illumine and 

 guide their footsteps through the forests, and we 

 learn that during the conquest of Mexico, a swarm 

 of these fire-flies were mistaken by the heated 

 imaginations of the besieged for an army of 

 matchlocks. Some of the centipedes or Myriopoda 

 have been found to be highly phosphorescent, 

 some of them having a luminous secretion, and 

 leaving behind them quite a fiery trail. 



The luminosity of the heron's breast is a re- 

 markable phenomenon, and the probable use 

 thereof has given rise to a good deal of speculation, 

 one of the most likely theories being that the light 

 emitted serves to attract the fish to the surface of 

 the water, when they fall an easy prey to the 

 watchful heron. The birds on which the phos- 

 phorescence has been observed are the night heron 

 (Nyctiardia grissa), and the blue crane (Ardeacaerulea). 

 The mucus surrounding frogs' eggs has been 

 frequently observed to give out a phosphorescent 

 light, and was mistaken by the ancients, when seen 

 in the luminous state, for masses of fallen meteoric 

 ore. The eggs of the grey lizard have also been 

 seen to emit phosphorescent light, and Dr. Car- 

 penter mentions an amphibian inhabiting Surinam 

 which is luminous. 



In the vegetable kingdom we shall find a goodly 

 number of lamps. Amongst the flowers of our 

 garden, the nasturtium (Tropoeolum majus) was seen 

 by the daughter of Linnaeus to emit flashes of 

 phosphorescent light in the gathering gloom of the 

 evening, and at the dawn of day. The same 

 phenomenon has been observed in the hairy red 

 poppy (Papaver pilosum), the double variety of 

 the common marigold (Calendula), the sunflower 

 (Helianthus annus), and the orange lily (Lilium 

 bulbiferum). A plant found in Asia and South 

 America, called Euphorbia phosphorea, emits when 

 cut a milky juice which is brilliantly phosphor- 

 escent at night when heated, and by using a stem 

 of the plant as a pen, the juice forms a luminous 

 ink. 



Probably the most familiar vegetable lamp is 

 that known as "touchwood," or "foxfire," which 

 is rotten wood permeated by the mycelium or 

 spawn of fungi, which becomes luminous in the 

 dark. Around the decayed arms of oaks, and old 

 tree-stumps is to be found a most interesting 

 luminous fungus, known asRhesomorpha subtenanea. 

 It is also to be seen gleaming with a soft phos- 

 phorescence in caves and coalmines, sufficient light 

 on some occasions being emitted to enable the 

 reading of ordinary print. Besides this plant there 

 are several other forms of fungus more or less 

 luminous to be found in forests, woods, caves and 

 churchyards, and no doubt these phosphorescent 

 plants, shining with their mysterious bluish-green 

 light, have played an important part as ghostly 

 visitors from another world. 



Lincoln Villa, 



Redhill. 



THE BRITISH MYCOLOGICAL SOCIETY, 



' I ''HIS Society, which now numbers some forty- 

 nine members, held its first annual week 

 fungus foray in Sherwood Forest. The members 

 assembled at Worksop on Monday, September 13th, 

 when The Lion Hotel was constituted the head 

 quarters. On Tuesday, September 14th, the woods 

 on the Welbeck Estate were explored, but little of 

 interest was discovered. In the evening, Mr. George 

 Massee, F.L.S., F.R.M.S., delivered his presidential 

 address on ' ' Mycological progress during the past 

 sixty years." 



There were, said Mr. Massee, four great workers 

 that stood out pre-eminent during that period, 

 namely, M. J. Berkeley, A. de Bary, L. R. and 

 C. Tulasne and O. Brefeld. Berkeley and Tulasne 

 did their work by the " contiguity method," that is, 

 they observed in the field that certain forms of 

 fungi were almost always succeeded by other forms, 

 hence they declared that these successive forms 

 were but stages in the life-history of certain fungi, 



and these assumptions have in many instances been 

 verified by the more accurate pure culture growths 

 that were initiated by De Bary and continued by 

 Brefeld. In 1836 Berkeley was responsible for 

 vol. v. of J. E. Smith's " English Flora," which 

 dealt with fungi ; therein is recorded the original 

 observations of a worker, and since then no work 

 on the subject has been anything else but a 

 compilation, and not the result of original observa- 

 tion. In 1837 Berkeley first demonstrated that the 

 Lycoperdeae and Phalloideae belonged to the 

 Basidiomycetes, and he was the first to go into 

 'the life-history of the potato disease, Phyiophthora 

 infestans, the resting state of which is till 

 this day a puzzle yef unsolved by mycologists. 

 Berkeley wrote over 325 articles on fungi, and was 

 one of the first to trace out the life-history of the 

 onion, vine disease, and many other mildews. In 

 1857, Berkeley published his "Introduction toCryp- 

 togamic Botany," and he was the first person to 



