152 FUNGI: NON-PATHOGENIC AND PATHOGENIC. 



ber of finger-like branches. On the point of each of these a 

 flask-shaped sterigma is developed. On the end of this a row 

 of oval spores appears. These break off, and can give rise to 

 new individuals. 



Yeasts and Torulae : Saccharomyces, Torula, Mycoderma. — 

 These are of the greatest importance, of course, in brewing 

 and baking. They only concern us as being of not uncommon 

 occurrence in the air. They consist of round or oval cells 

 usually many times larger than bacteria. They often reproduce 

 themselves by budding (vide Fig. 60, E, F), a portion of the cell 

 protruding, and finally being cut off to form a new individual. 

 Endogenous spore formation also occurs {vide Fig. 60, G). 

 Many of the torulae, when growing in colonies, are brilliantly 

 coloured. What their true morphological relationships are it is 

 difficult to say, but they present many analogies to the oidia of 

 such forms as oidium lactis. 



A knowledge of the above type forms will enable the student 

 to recognise the more common fungi as such, when they present 

 themselves to him. For further information on this group he is 

 referred to De Bary's book on The Fungi. Certain fungi 

 closely related to the above are pathogenic agents. Some 

 aspergilU have been found to grow in the animal tissues and to 

 produce death, and to the fungi also belong the saprolegnia 

 ferax (the cause of a disease of salmon), the tinea tonsurans 

 and the Achorion Schoenleinii. 



Blastomycetic Dermatitis. — In America and Germany within 

 recent years attention has been called by Gilchrist, Busse, Stokes, 

 Schenck, Ophiils, Montgomery, and many others, to a class of 

 diseases of the skin, resembling epithelioma and tuberculosis, 

 which, in the course of development, may become generalised 

 throughout the body and result fatally, and post mortem show- 

 ing more or less extensive tuberculoid conditions of the internal 

 organs and tissues. In the pus of abscesses and in sections of 

 diseased tissue from all cases reported, round bodies with doubly 

 contoured walls, occasionally budding, and closely resembling 

 yeast cells, have been described, and cultures from most of the 

 cases have yielded a blastomycetic organism which undoubtedly 

 is identical to those bodies seen in the tissues. Although 

 presenting some variations amongst themselves in culture media, 

 Ricketts believes them to be of very closely related species of 



