76 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
floats about in the drop, leaving the exospore quite empty. 
This single transparent cell, which is three or four times the 
size of the original spore, and is the first cell of the pileus of a 
new plant, is in its turn commonly attacked and pierced by the 
spermatozoids. Sometimes a spore is surrounded and pierced 
by a large number of spermatozoids, whilst at other times it 
receives the attack of one body only ; this is, however, sufficient, 
for I have frequently seen the first cells discharged from the 
orifice made by a single spermatozoid, and the latter body again 
pushed out by the cell. The spermatozoids which have a single 
turn of a spiral revolve rapidly, and, when they come in contact 
with a spore, not unfrequently creep with an amoeba-like move- 
ment over the surface, before they discharge their contents into 
the protoplasm of the spore. These bodies, as seen in Coprinus 
radiatus , are shown in the accompanying figure, enlarged to 
1,000 and 3,000 diameters, and they are precisely the same in 
Agaricus lacrymccbundus. When the spermatozoids of the latter 
species emerge they are dark brown in colour, and here they 
resemble the spores ; the at first colourless contents of basidia and 
cystidia alike become at first differentiated and then oxidised 
on exposure to the air. In a minute species like Coprinus coma - 
tus , where the growth of the plant is very rapid, and hundreds 
of generations are produced in one season, new plants are rapidly 
reproduced from the spores, and the growth can be watched ; 
but in Agaricus lacrymabundus the case is very different, 
for it is probable that it would take many months (if not 
a whole year) to grow a perfect fungus belonging to this 
species from the spores. It must also be remembered that 
although this Agaric produces many millions of spores, yet 
the plant does not increase in actual numbers ; for if all the 
spores produced plants, then in one year the world would be 
covered with this species only. For one spore which grows, 
hundreds of millions must be failures. In a former paragraph 
reference was made to bodies intermediate in form between 
cystidia and basidia, and bodies of this nature are common on 
the upper part of the stem in Agaricus lacrymabundus ; they 
are shown on the natural size section at g. The bodies in 
this position secrete and distil a semi-milky fluid, which they 
excrete in drops, which drops are invariably dotted all over the 
upper portion of the stem. It must not be thought that this 
distillation is peculiar to the species under notice, for it is a 
character (though till now unpublished) of whole sections of 
Agarics. For instance, certain groups coming under Tricho- 
loma are described by Fries as “ lamellis decolorantibus, rufo- 
maculatis 1. cinerascentibus.” Now these brown spots on the 
gills, when examined under the microscope, are seen to be pro- 
duced by a liquid which changes colour, and which is distilled 
