CARPOSPOREM. 
and descending portions of the rotating protoplasm of a cell run side by side in opposite 
directions and neutralise each other, and M'here therefore there is no motion. The 
direction of the rotatory motion in each cell stands in a regular relation to that of all the 
other cells of the plant, and hence to its morphological structure, as has been shown by 
A. Braun. 
FORMS WITHOUT CHLOROPHYLL. 
To this second principal group of the class Carposporeae belong all those plants, 
the fructifications of which have long been known as Fungi or Mushrooms, but 
which are now known under the names of Ascomycetes, JEcidiomycetes, and 
Basidiomycetes. As a matter of fact a process of sexual reproduction has been 
actually observed as yet in only a few out of the very numerous genera of these 
plants, and these all belong to a single sub-division, namely that of the Ascomycetes. 
Among the Basidiomycetes mere traces of such a process have as yet been detected, 
and among the ^cidiomycetes not even these have been observed. Nevertheless it 
is permissible to assume, until further information is obtained, not only that such 
a process actually takes place, but also that it agrees in its principal points with that 
observed in the Ascomycetes ; at any rate such an assumption seems to be imme- 
diately suggested by the very similar course of development which obtains in these 
three groups ^ We are, in fact, somewhat in the same position with respect to the 
sexual reproduction of these plants as were the botanists of the last century with 
respect to that of Phanerogams; they had observed the process of fertilisation in 
a few cases only, but they did not hesitate to assert, arguing from analogy based 
upon the similarity of the parts of the flowers and of the fruits developed therefrom, 
the sexuality of all Phanerogams. 
Accepting the facts established by Tulasne, De Bary, and their followers with 
reference to the Ascomycetes, we may describe the life-history of one of these Fungi 
as follows. From the true spore (carpospore) there is developed a vegetative body, 
the mycelium, consisting of much-branched multicellular filaments, the hyphae, 
which covers the surface or penetrates into the interior of the substratum upon 
which it grows ; it has often but a short term of existence, but it may occasionally 
continue to grow, as it appears, for years. In many cases this mycelium is capable 
of producing non-sexual reproductive cells which nearly always occur as conidia, and 
are usually developed upon special branches of the mycelium, the conidiophores, rn 
large numbers by abstriction. These conidia, which correspond to the zoogonidia 
of Algse and to the tetragonidia of the Florideae, produce new mycelia on germina- 
tion. Usually a mycelium reproduces itself thus asexually for many generations, 
and consequently many Fungi are only known in this stage of their life-history. In 
all cases, however, in which the hfe-history of a Fungus has been continuously traced, 
it has been observed that, under certain favourable conditions, the mycelium finally 
^ [From the researches of Brefeld (Unters, ueb. Schimmelpilze, III, IV) it appears that there is 
no ground for assuming the existence of sexual reproduction in the Basidiomycetes. He is of opinion 
also that no sexual process takes place in the Ascomycetes, for, though they still possess sexual 
organs, these organs (except in Lichens) seem to have lost their function.] 
X 
