188 NOVA SCOTIAN FUNGI. — SOMMERS. 



aspect, and my present task is done. I have endeavored to de- 

 scribe to you the bones of the salmon (Salmo-Salar) as they 

 appear to me to be. I have no theory to advance or support, and 

 it is too much to expect that in what I have read to you there is 

 no error, but it may serve to help some enquirer on his way, and 

 if such be the result my time will not have been spent in vain* 



Art. VIII. — Nova Scotian Fungi. By J. Sommers, M. D. 



(Read Jan. 26, '80J 



The present paper affords a very short list of some of the more 

 common species of our mycological flora, the result of a three 

 months' study of a local botanical region. 



During the time very many specimens have passed through 

 our hands. Difficulties in diagnosis, want of sufficient time, and 

 the evanescent characters of many of them, have been important 

 factors in determining the length of our list, but we have observed 

 enough to convince us that the fungi are capable of affording a 

 field for study which will take many years of patient and labori- 

 ous investigation to render complete. 



Viewed either from scientific or economic point, the fungi 

 furnish us with interesting matter for study and comparison 

 Their organization, growth and reproduction afford matter for 

 originality in their treatment by scientists. Their Medical and 

 nutritive properties — their parasitical end destructive tendencies 

 supply matter for reflection on the part of the economist. 



To the student of nature they are of interest, as situate on the 

 border line between the dead and living things of earth — maintain- 

 ing the balance of power, devourers of dead organic matter, 

 destroyers of decaying organisms ; they supply, also, a bountiful 

 store for hosts of highly vitalized, organized beings, and are not 

 even disdained by man himself. 



The local peculiarities of our Province now existing, viz, its 

 dense woods and extensive swampy barrens, fnrnish favourable 

 conditions for the development of this class of vegetable, which our 

 •dry atmosphere would, under other conditions, seriously interfere 



