FUNGI. 



27 



shelter of the Polyporus above. Patouillard has 

 shown that this genus could form abnormal pores on 

 any part of the exposed cap. Jacobasch observed 

 that, on the upper surface of the cap of P. salphureus 

 coming in contact with the moist ground, it produced 

 spores. 



Cotton observed that spore-formation constantly 

 ensued on the upper surface of Sparassis when it 

 became inverted. 



Inverted Caps. — There may be left out of serious 

 consideration cases of inverted stalked caps which are 

 obviously the result of a weaker individual being 

 carried up from the ground by a stronger one, after 

 their cap-surfaces had become fused at an early stage 

 (PI. I, fig. 2). 



We are concerned here with a totally distinct 

 phenomenon, which may be divided into two sets, viz., 

 (1) the congenital formation of an inverted cap or 

 caps, from the earliest stage onward, on the upper 

 surface of the primary cap ; (2) the formation of the 

 inverted caps by local invagination of the margin of 

 the primary one. It is held, however, that the two 

 sets represent really the same phenomenon, of which 

 (1) represents the final and completed stage of (2), 

 arising congenitally and isolated. In fact, the pheno- 

 menon is perfectly analogous to that of ring-fasciation 

 of a flower or capitulum as described in a later section 

 of this work, where we see that the central inverted 

 portion, due in its origin to an invagination ol the 

 outer parts, may also arise congenitally, showing no 

 trace of how it came to be there. 



The writer has not seen such early stages, but is 

 informed that inverted caps have been seen to arise 

 as small papillae on the surface of the primary cap, 

 remote from the margin, developing into structures 

 sometimes raised up considerably, on sterile tissue, 

 from the cap-surface, and in the majority of cases not 

 producing a stipe from the centre of the gill-tissue. 

 To this category would belong such a case as that of 



