B95 
Order YIII. FUNGI. 
Cellular plants, composed of short or long cells or filaments, variously com- 
bined, usually growing on decayed or living substances, or in earth impreg- 
nated with organic matter. Fructification of spores, that are either naked or 
enclosed in membranous tubes ( asci ), then called sporidia, or terminating 
filaments or spicular cells ( sporophores or basidia). Spores germinating by 
elongation of the outer covering or protrusion of the lining membrane. 
Fungi absorb oxygen and exhale carbonic acid, like animals, and abound 
like them also in nitrogen. 
A vast, complicated, and varied Order, approaching Lichens through Peziza , Sphesria, 
and other Ascomycetes, and differing from Alga chiefly in growing upon land, in deriving 
their nourishment through rooting filaments, and in their chemical constituents. 
The species hitherto collected in New Zealand give a most imperfect idea of the extent, 
variety, and structural characters of this vast Order, which are of themselves the study of a 
lifetime. New Zealand no doubt contains several thousand species. 
A multitude of terms have been applied to designate the various modifications of the 
organs of growth, vegetation, and reproduction of Fungi. I have reduced them to a minimum 
here, and doubt not they might be still further reduced with advantage. The most useful 
may be thus defined : — Fungi have no root proper, hut usually have a mycelium , which con- 
sists of branching or simple white or dark filaments, that ramify through the ground, deriving 
nourishment from it (as the spawn of mushrooms), or in dead wood, hastening its decay, or 
in living anirtial and vegetable tissues ; these mycelia usually produce chemical change (fer- 
mentation, etc.) where they are developed. The “Dry-rot,” the “Vinegar-plant,” the 
“Yeast-plant,” “Amadou,” and the white spreading fibrous growths found in cellars and 
pits, are all mycelia of various Fungi. When the mycelium casts off fine matted filaments, 
it is called “ byssoid.” 
The surface on which the mycelium or Fungus grows, is called the matrix. 
The unusual terms applied to the forms of Fungi are : — determinate , when the form is de- 
fined ; effuse , when spread over the matrix ; emergent or enmpent, when developed below 
the cuticle or bark of a plant and bursting through it ; immersed , when sunk in the matrix ; 
resupinate, when, as it were, turned upside down, thehymenium being upwards, — a term ap- 
plied only to those tribes in which it is normally downwards. 
When the substance of the Fungus forms a sort of amorphous mass, in which closed sacs 
containing the spores are sunk, it is called a stroma. 
In the more perfect determinate-formed Fungi, the fructification is spread over the sur- 
face and exposed ; the fructifying surface is then called hymenium , and the layer beneath it 
the kymenopkorum ; sometimes this hymenium is spread over both surfaces of thin mem- 
branous plates, or the surfaces of pores, as in mushrooms, Polypori, etc., when the inter- 
mediate substance of such plates, etc., is called a trama. 
The hymenium may consist of spicular cells {basidia or sporophores) tipped by spores ; or 
of asci, containing sporidia , exactly as in Lichens ; or of a nucleus or capillitium of mixed 
filaments aud spores. 
When the hymenium or spores are enclosed in proper membranes, these are called peri- 
ihecia or peridia ; the former generally applying to separate sacs imbedded in a common 
stroma, the latter to a membrane covering the whole Fungus. 
When the fruit-bearing portion of the Fungus takes a definite shape, different from aud 
usually larger than the stem, it is called a pileus, as the cap of a mushroom. 
For all we know of the fungology of New Zealand, we are indebted to the Rev. AT. 
J. Berkeley, the most eminent English author, who worked up this Order for the Floras of the 
Antarctic Expedition. From that of New Zealand, the following descriptions are chiefly 
compiled, and I am further indebted to that gentleman’s good offices for revising this com- 
pilation from his own labours. 
The principal books that should be procured to pursue this difficult study, are Berkeley’s 
