CHAPTER III. —SPORES OF FUNGI. 71 
if kept dry it will continue to adhere to the gonidiophore. Spores abjointed 
close together in large numbers cohere through the coalescence of their gelatinous 
envelopes and form masses which break up again in water. In the case of spores 
successively abjointed on the free apex of one or several closely adjacent sterigmata, 
if the development takes place without interruption in a damp atmosphere, the 
gelatinous substance deliquesces and forms a spherical drop, in which the spores 
lie embedded as in a vesicle. And all this occurs alike in those cases where the 
successive abscision affects spores arranged in rows (gonidia of Nectria Solani’) 
and in those where they are in heads (Acrostalagmus cinnabarinus, gonidia of 
Claviceps and Epichloe). Where abscision of large numbers of spores takes place 
inside narrow receptacles provided with narrow orifices, their release from the 
receptacle is effected by the formation of a gelatinous or gummy substance which 
swells in water and emerges with the spores from the 
receptacle. Examples are to be seen in numerous gonidia- 
receptacles in the Pyrenomycetes. See Division II. 
A description of the development of the spore-chains 
in the aecidium of Chrysomyxa Rhododendri’ will show 
the mode in which the spores are shed in the Uredineae 
by the solution and disappearance of a stalk-cell or in- 
termediate cell beneath each spore. The spores in each 
chain are formed by successive abjunction at the upper 
extremity of a short club-shaped basidium, from which 
at first an almost cylindrica] spore-mother-cell is abjointed 
by a plane transverse septum. This cell, which is about 
one and a half times longer than broad, subsequently 
changes its shape; one side bulges considerably, the 
other only slightly, and the whole cell thus becomes 
irregularly barrel-shaped. It is then divided into two 
unequal daughter-cells by a plane partition-wall which 
runs from the angle formed by the basal cross septum 
and the more prominent side obliquely towards the 
flatter side, cutting off the lower third part of it; the 
lower of the two daughter-cells is a small wedge-shaped 
stalk-cell or intermediate cell, the upper is larger and 
developes into a spore. The spore is at first of a some- 
what complex and irregular form, as is sufficiently apparent 
from what has been said above and from the Fig. 37. It FIG. 37. Chrysomyxa Rhododen- 
increases considerably in size, assuming in so doing a um an amanma chan of spores 
nearly spherical or ellipsoid figure, and becomes invested thetext. Magn. 600 times. 
with a new membrane of considerable thickness, into the 
structure of which we must not at present enter. The stalk-cell grows at the same 
time in height and breadth, remaining much lower on the side where its wedge-form 
thinned out originally than on the opposite and now convex side, and has an 
elliptic transverse section. Ultimately the stalk-cell disappears, its membrane and 
the outer primary lamellae of the membrane of the mother-cell and of the transverse 
septum swell up, become gelatinous, and finally vanish entirely with the cell-contents, 
and the spores are now isolated. The division into stalk-cell and spore is usually 
found in the third youngest spore-mother-cell on a basidium, more rarely in the fourth 
youngest. The gelatinous dissolution of the stalk-cell is usually far advanced in the 


1 De Bary, Kartoffelkrankheit, p. 41. Reinke und Berthold, Die Zersetzung d. Kartoffel durch 
Pilze, p. 39. 
2 Bot. Ztg. 1879, p. 803. 
