REPRODUCTION OP THE A8COMYCETES. 
55 
broken up by the works of M. Tnlasne, slionld see more and 
more diminished the number of its members, and that each species, 
united to its different forms, should be removed and placed in the 
natural range which belongs to it, and that one should finally 
suppress from mycology this group, which is only provisional. 
This fact, if it takes place, would mark a considerable progress of 
the science, the preceding remarks having in part been aimed at 
attaining this result. 
The taxonomic importance of the asexual reproductory appa- 
ratus is evident among the seaweeds, and in this great group of 
vegetables it permits, concurrently with the mode of sexual repro- 
duction, of making either some happy separations in some genera 
very much alike in appearance, or some important approachments 
between some others which appear far removed from one another; 
it is thus that the nature of the zoospores which are furnished with 
a ciliary coronet permits of allying the jEdogonium with the Bol- 
hochcete, so different as to mien. Among Fungi one ought to obtain 
some similar results by analogous considerations. 
En resuine, the magnificent work, the “ Selecta Fungorum Car- 
pologia,” shows that the Asconiycetes possess many modes of 
reproduction ; the proofs which are there offered are irrefutable ; 
these four modes of reproduction give place to the formation of 
four orders of spores : — 
1st. The endospores. 
2nd. The stylospores. 
3rd. The spermatia. 
4 th. The conidia. 
The spermatia have been considered, in consequence of their 
refusal to enter into germination, to be fecundatory bodies. One 
has seen above that many of the forms considered as not germin- 
ating may enter into vegetation under particular conditions, and 
that they are reproductive bodies like the others. Such is the 
first result of the present work. 
The morphologic study of the spermatia has shown that many 
of the conidial forms may be considered as equivalent to the sper- 
matia, and that they are the homologous form ; one has been able 
to deduce some conclusions relative to the species removed from the 
confused group of the Mucedines. Still, under the name of 
conidia, M. Tulasne designates also certain spores entirely 
different from the first, and which resemble some stylospores ; it 
is necessary henceforth to consider them as such. Thus results a 
considerable modification in the group of the Asconiycetes, and a 
great unity in the comparison of the organs. The Fungi possess 
two orders of asexual spores — the stylospores and the spermatia — 
which are endowed with the germinative property, may be born 
free or in the interior of cavities, and exist simultaneously, or show 
themselves isolated with the perithecia ; such is the very simple 
conception which may be arrived at from the preceding pages. 
