32 FUNGI. 
of which they are then composed bears considerable resemblance 
to sarcode, and, did they never change from this, there might be 
some excuse for doubting as to their vegetable nature ; but as the 
species proceed towards maturity they lose their mucilaginous 
texture, and become a mass of spores, intermixed with threads, 
surrounded by a cellular peridium. Take, for instance, the genus 
Trichia, and we have in the matured specimens a somewhat 
globose peridium, not larger than a mustard seed, and some- 
times nearly of the same colour; this ultimately ruptures and 
exposes a mass of minute yellow spherical spores, intermixed 
with threads of the same colour.* These threads, when highly 
magnified, exhibit in themselves a spiral arrangement, which 
has been the basis of some controversy, and in some species 
these threads are externally spinulose. The chief controversy 
a 
Fic. 10.—a. Threads of Trichia, 6, Portion furtber magnified, with spores. c. Por- 
tion of spinulose thread. 
on these threads has been whether the spiral markings are 
external or internal, whether caused by twisting of the thread 
or by the presence of an external or internal fibre. The spiral 
appearance has never been called in question, only the structure 
from whence it arises, and this, like the strie of diatoms, is 
very much an open question. Mr. Currey held that the spiral 
® Wigand, ‘‘Morphologie des Genres Trichia et Arcyria,” in “Ann des Sci, 
Nat.” 4ine sér. xvi. p. 228, 
