FUNG 299 
mystery, to be referred humbly to the simple ex- 
ercise of the Creator’s will. 
Fungi are extremely simple in their organiza- 
tion. They bring us back to first principles, and 
reveal to us the secret manner in which nature 
builds up her most complicated vegetable struc- 
tures. They are composed entirely of cellular 
tissue, of a definite aggregation of loose, more or 
less oval, elliptical cells, with cavities between 
them. These cells in many species may be seen 
by the naked eye, and consist of little closed 
sacs of transparent colourless membrane. Here 
is the starting-point of life. Such cells are the 
primary germ or element from which every living 
thing, whether plant or animal, is produced. The 
whole process of vegetable growth is but a con- 
tinuous multiplication of these cells. In the 
flowering plants the various vessels and organs 
arise in a differentiation, or a setting apart of par- 
ticular groups of cells, and altering their forms 
and contents for the performance of particular 
functions in the economy of the plant. In the 
fungi, however, this specializing process advances 
but a little way. Their entire structure is uni- 
form ; each group of cells is an exact repetition of 
all the other cells ; one part of each is exactly like 
the rest. There are no leaves, stems, or roots. 
Every cell is an assimilating surface; the whole 
