18 



FUNGI. 



three distinct parts requiring elucidation, viz. the , rooting 

 slender fibres that traverse the soil, and termed the mycelium, 

 or spawn, the stem and cap or pileus, which together con-/ 

 stitute what is called the liymenophore, and the plates or gills 

 on the under surface of the cap, which bear the hymenium. 

 The earliest condition in which the mushroom can be recognized 

 as a vegetable entity is in that of the " spawn " or mycelium, 

 which is essentially an agglomeration of vegetating spores. Its 

 normal form is that of branched, slender, entangled, anasto- 

 mosing, hyaline threads. At certain privileged points of the my- 

 celium, the threads seem to be aggregated, and become centres 

 of vertical extension. At first only a small nearly globose bud- 



Fio. 1.— Agaric in Process of Growth. 



ding, like a grain of" mustard seed, is visible, but this after- 

 wards increases rapidly, and other similar buddings or swellings 

 appear at the base.* These are the young hymenophore. As 



* A curious case occurred some years since at Bury St. Edmunds, which may be 

 mentioned here in connection with the development of these nodules. Two children 

 had died under suspicious circumstances, and an examination of the body of 

 the latter after exhumation was made, a report having arisen that the child died 

 after eating mushrooms. As certain white nodules appeared on the inner surface 

 of the intestines, it was at once hastily concluded that the spores of the mush- 

 room had germinated, and that the nodules were infant mushrooms. This 

 appeared to one of us so strange, that application was made for specimens 

 which were kindly forwarded, and a cursory glance was enough to convince us 

 that they were not fungoid. An examination under the microscope further con- 

 firmed the diagnosis, and the application of nitric acid showed that the nodules 

 were merely due to chalk mixture, which had been given to the child for the 

 diarrhetic symptoms under which he succumbed. 



