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POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
PART II. 
“ W e’ll make a feast in our mossy dell, 
Of infant Puff-ball and rare Morel, 
And many a favoured guest shall sup 
On Lily-dew from a siller cup ; 
The aged Puff-balls shall help us to cheat 
The dainty bees of their luscious meat ; 
While others shall burn to give us light, 
And scare from our dell the dreary night.” 
Wickliffe Lane. 
The second family of Fungi in the Spoi’e group is called 
Gasteromycetes, and is characterized by the hymenium being- 
enclosed in a single or double bag-. 
This family contains a group of subterranean Fungi, one 
member of which, the Melanogaster variegatus, used to be 
sold in Bath under the name of Red Truffle. Its bag or 
peridium is thin, and the spores are disposed on the summits 
of cells, in the cavities into which the interior is divided. 
Nearly allied to these are the Phalloidei, well known through 
the undesirable quality of their representative the Stinkhorn 
(. Phallus impudicus) , more politely named Wood- witch in some 
counties. Here the plant is enclosed in a peridium in youth, 
upon the bursting of which the coarsely cellular column shoots 
up, bearing as a capital a honeycombed pileus, from which the 
hymenium exudes in greenish jelly of most offensive odour, 
which, nevertheless, is g-reedily devoured by flies. This odour 
resembles that of putrid animal matter, and I remember hearing 
the owner of some beautiful grounds lament that some rabbits 
must be decaying among holes in the rocks, for the smell 
during the last few days had made the grounds unendurable. 
He did not lay any blame upon the obelisk-like Fungi growing 
here and there in the said woods, and the removal of which 
restored the grounds to their original purity. 
The Glathrus, another member of this family, is yet more 
offensive in its odour, — though so gay in colour, being crimson 
and orange, and branched like coral. It is seldom found ex- 
cept in Devonshire. 
The Geaster, or Earth- star, belongs to the Trichogastre 
group, characterized by its paper-like peridium. One with a 
double peridium, G. fimbriatus, forms a beautiful object : the 
outer coat bursts and tears into six or seven pieces, which roll 
back and lie on the ground in a star shape, while the inner 
coat opens only at the summit, from whence the dust-like spores 
