48 On the Fungi Growing in Mines. 



remains of a hyphoraycetes hanging from the roof, pilens 

 campannlate, strise very distinct, giving the edge a crennlate 

 form ; so soft and brittle were they that I did not succeed 

 in saving a single specimen ; however, I stood under an 

 umbrella, up to my ankles in water, for nearly half an hour, 

 to get a fair sketch of the plants with their surroundings. 

 The lamellse grow from the margin in two lengths, remote, 

 white stem, almost translucent, long, attenuated towards 

 centre, solid, with very short floccose hairs. In No. 8 level 

 it was very wet, and fungi were to be found even on 

 comparatively new timber. A semi-transparent polyporus 

 is very common, hard, very uneven, all over knobs and 

 excrescences, except where the hymenophorum appears, 

 the pores are small, but deep and irregular, and the 

 hymenium presents a bright orange, contrasting well with 

 the browns and glassy grays of the matrix. Some of the 

 slabs were almost covered with a creeping hyphomycetes, 

 spreading out in all directions, in the same manner as lichens; 

 they are protean in shape, some as line as threads, creeping 

 in radial form from a somewhat thicker centre ; in other 

 specimens the branches get wider and wider until they look 

 like ribbons, but the ends of all invariably split up into very 

 fine threads. The foregoing are formed of exceedingly fine 

 soft silky fibres, which take root in the timber as they 

 radiate, making it impossible to remove them without 

 destruction. In one species the substance is thicker and 

 the structure is not so soft and silky but rougher, almost 

 corky, although still brittle. This fungus is covered with 

 excrescences, and all the specimens I found were divided 

 into three thick branches, each ending in knobs thicker than 

 the stems ; the knobs were colom^ed brown, whilst the 

 remainder was white with occasional brown patches. 



Another distinct species was leathery, and peeled off" easily 

 from the post on which it grew ; the structure was floccose, 

 and all branches ended in from three to five pointed ends, 

 even in the very young plants the clavate endings were 

 distinctl}?' visible. I noticed that the timber most liable to 

 the attacks of fungi was that of the messmate (Eucalyptus 

 Obliqua) easity recognisable by its bark. I should mention 

 that the clavate endings were of an elongated cone-shape, 

 white, and velvety to the touch, but much firmer than the 

 rest of the plant. In a very wet part of No. 8 level the 

 rotten timber produced a yqyj pretty agaric, pileus 

 campanulate. of a light lavender colour, striae well-marked, 



