112 FUNGI. 
and dried them to a certain degree, but did not leave on tho 
fingers any phosphorescent matter. These parts continued with 
the same luminous intensity after holding them in the mouth so 
as to moisten them with saliva; plunged into water, held to the 
flame of a candle so that the heat they acquired was very appre- 
ciable to the-touch, they still emitted in the dark a feeble light ; it 
was the same after being held in water heated to 30°C. ; but put- 
ting them in water bearing a temperature of 55° C. extinguished 
them entirely. They are equally extinguished if held in the mouth 
until they catch the temperature; perhaps, still, it might be 
attributed less to the heat which is communicated to them than 
to the deficiency of sufficient oxygen, because I have seen some 
stalks, having become dull in the mouth, recover after a few 
instants a little of their phosphorescence. A young stalk 
which had been split lengthwise, and the internal substance of 
which was very phosphorescent, could imbibe olive oil many 
times and yet continue for a long time to give a feeble light. 
By preserving these Rhizomorphe in an adequate state of 
humidity, I have been able for many evenings to renew the 
examination of their phosphorescence; the commencement of 
dessication, long before they really perish, deprives them of the 
faculty of giving light. Those which had been dried for more 
than a month, when plunged into water, commenced to vegetate 
anew and send forth numerous branches in a few days; but I 
could only discover phosphorescence at the surface of these new 
formations, or very rarely in their immediate neighbourhood, 
the mother stalks appearing to have lost by dessication their 
luminous properties, and did not recover them on being recalled 
to life. These observations prove that what Schmitz has written 
was not true, that all parts of these fungi were seldom phos- 
phorescent. 
The luminous phenomenon in question is without doubt more 
complicated than it appears, and the causes to which we attri- 
bute it are certainly powerfully modified by the general character 
of the objects in which they reside. Most of the German 
botanists give this explanation, others suppose that it forms at 
first or during its continuance a special matter, in which the 
