24 MICROSCOPIC FUNGI. 



eitlier globular or hemisplierical (or in some in- 

 stances elongated), more or less immersedj and at 

 length opening at the apex (fig. 153) by a regu- 

 larly formed minute ostiolum. The inner wall of 

 the peridium is covered with a thick forest of 

 simple filaments standing on end. From the 

 summit of these filaments or sterigmata, the 

 spermatia are borne. These are either isolated or 

 associated together in strings or chaplets, are 

 exceedingly minute, of an ovoid or oblong shape, 

 and are produced in such numbers as to fiU the 

 cavity of the spermogone. Besides these, a viscid 

 fluid is secreted, in which the spermatia are im- 

 mersed, and which is expelled with them from tho 

 orifice of the peridium. According to the density 

 of this fluid, or the hygrometric state of the atmo- 

 sphere, it appears sometimes in drops, and some- 

 times oozing out in threads or cirrhi from the 

 spermogones. To compare minute things with 

 gigantic, as a recent author has observed, it 

 resembles the lava issuing from the crater of a 

 volcano. The colour of this spermatiferous matter 

 is commonly orange, but in some instances brown, 

 though not constantly of the same colour as the 

 spores produced from the same mycelium. This 

 gelatiaous substance is dissolved away from the 

 granular bodies which are immersed in it, by 

 adding a little water upon the sUde on which the 

 mass is placed for examination. The granules, or 

 spermatia, then exhibit those pecuhar movements 



