INTEODUCTION TO CEYPTOGAMIC BOTANY. 321 



only a sort of prothallus, from which the mycelium grows, pro- 

 ducing at the tips or on lateral branchlets bodies of various 

 forms, which are themselves capable of germination, and im- 

 mediately reproduce the species. These bodies were, I believe, 

 first observed by myself in Tilletia caries* though with no- 

 thing more than a suspicion of their real character. I found 

 that whenever the spores of bunt germinated linear or fusiform 

 bodies were generated, which ultimately became joined after 

 the fashion of Zygnema ; and Mr. Broome and Thwaites, on 

 repeating the experiment at my request, obtained the same 

 result. In my uncertainty as to their real nature, they were 

 described and figured as Fusisporium, inosculans in the 

 Transactions of the Horticultiu-al Society of London, and in 

 the Encyclopaedia of Agriculture, under the word Bunt. Ex- 

 traneous bodies were then detected in the species of Podisoma, 

 but without any clearer notion of their import. Messrs. Tulasne, 

 having had their attention called to the dualism which pre- 

 vails amongst certain Fungi, ascertained that these growths 

 were general wherever they could obtain germination, and 

 that the bodies produced varied extremely in form, being 

 sometimes perfectly globose, sometimes extremely elongated. 

 In Podisoma (Fig. 6, a), where a gelatinous element is pre- 

 sent, soldering together the elongated stems with their spores 

 into a gelatinous mass, the bodies are oblong and curved, and 

 resemble closely the homologous bodies in Tremella. In 

 that genus, too, there is an approach to a prothallus, though, if 

 it be so considered, germination does not take place at the 

 expense of the secondary membrane, but by a simple extension 

 of the outer-f membrane or epispore. To add to the resem- 

 blance there is some sort of definite arrangement ; besides which, 

 in one or two species of Dacrymyces the prothallic sporophores 

 are septate, while they are lobed in Tremella. In some cases 

 the true fnait is produced only at a late period. 



» Journal of Hort. Soc, 1. c, p. 112. 



f This structure appeared to me so incomprehensible when I pub- 

 lished my Memoir on the Hymenium, that I did not venture to figure 

 it. My original sketch is still in existence, and accords precisely with 

 Tulasne's observations in his admirable Memoir. 

 21 



