MICROSCOPIC PDirai. 

 CHAPTER IL 



BPEEMOGONES. 



iN addition to their spore-bearing spots, lichens 

 have for some time been known to possess other 

 organSj termed spermogones, which are probably- 

 concerned more or less in the reproductive pro- 

 cess. The first intimation of the existence of 

 similar bodies in the entophytal fungi originated 

 with M. TJnger in 1833, but it was left to Dr. de 

 Bary and the Messrs. Tulasne, twenty years later, 

 to examine and determine aa</isfactorily the nature 

 and value of the spermogones of the TJredines. 

 It was at first believed that the smaller pustules — 

 which sometimes' precede, and sometimes accom- 

 pany, the cluster-cups and some other alhed fungi 

 — ^were distinct species developed simultaneously 

 therewith, or members of a new genus, which, 

 under the name of Mcidiolum excmthemaimn, found 

 a place in the mycologic system. 



Without staying to trace the stages through 

 which the elucidation of their true nature pro- 

 ceeded, it will suffice for our purpoSiO to teU what 

 is now known of these secondary organs ; to 

 accomplish which we must stand greatly indebted 

 to the independent researches of Messrs. de Bary 

 and Tulasne. It has been demonstrated that both 

 these bodies, namely, the primary organs or cluster- 



