956 



XTII. FUNGI. 



formerly served as amadou and "was used as a haemostatic ; it was also burnt in hives to stifle bees. 

 The SclerodermcB outwardly resemble Lycoperdons, and their interior recalls the colour and texture of 

 Truffles; but their sulphurous alliaceous smell prevents their being used as food, pigs even rejecting them. 



Geastrum hyyroi^ehicum, a hypogeal globose plant, presents a curious phenomenon : when mature, 

 and still underground, if the season be dry, the outer envelope, which is hard, tough, and hygrometric, 

 divides into strips from the crown to the base ; these strips spread horizontally, raisifig the plant above 

 its former position in the ground ; on rain or damp weather supervening, the strips return to their former 

 position ; on the return of the drought, this process is repeated, until the Fungus reaches the surface, 

 becomes epigeal, and spreads out there ; then the membrane of the conceptacle opens to emit the spores 

 in the form of dust. 



Podisoma Jimiperi-Sabinee also belongs to the gyoup of Bamdiospore<e. This plant is confounded with 

 Gymnosporangium aurantiacum, and to it is attiibuted the production of Sastelia cancellata, a disease 

 which first appears in the form of orange patches sprinkled with little black spots, on the leaves of the 

 Peai'-tree. The experiments which we Lave carried on to verify this transformation of genus and species 

 not having confirmed it, we wait for fresh proofs before admitting a theory of metamorphoses and trans- 

 formations which tend to upset all the ideas we have acquired in mycology, by transferring to the 

 Vegetable Kingdom the series of phenomena which zoologists call ' alternation of generations,' or 

 'digenesis.' It is now admitted that the loose comparison drawn by the anatomists of the seventeenth 

 century between the animal egg and its appendages, and the vegetable egg, long retarded our knowledge 

 of the fertilization of Phaenogamic plants : let us then beware of bequeathing a similar stumbling-block 

 to our successors by introducing into science theories regarding the specific identity of productions 

 so dissimilar in appearance, and of which their author even confesses that we can searcelj' hope to obtain 

 a direct proof. 



Teibe II. TUEGABPOEEJal. 



Spores usually contained by eights in cells (theccB, sporangia), covering wholly 

 or partially the surface of a receptacle, or the interior of a conceptacle. Thecee 

 accompanied or not by paraphyses, and opening at the top by an inconspicuous 

 operculum, for the emission of simple or chambered spores. 



Section I. — Thecse elongated, covering the surface of a receptacle {Ectothecce). 



PEINCIPAL GENERA. 



