LYMAN: STUDIES OF HYMENOMYCETES. 
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Autobasidiomycetes. 
The development of polymorphism in this group is much inferior 
to that shown by the Protobasidiomycetes. True conidia have been 
found in but few species, and although oidia and chlamydospores are 
tolerably common, very many species apparently produce basidio- 
spores only. 
Gasteromycetes. 
So far as can be determined from our present knowledge, there is 
almost no polymorphism among the angiocarpic Autobasidiomycetes. 
The only examples which have come to the writer’s notice are the two 
mentioned below. But few cultures have been made of the basidio- 
spores, however, and hence little is known of the nature of the mycelium 
and of its possible methods of reproduction. 
In Sphaerobolus (Fischer, ’84) the interior of the mature fructifica¬ 
tion becomes a mass of mucilage in which are embedded basidiospores 
and cells which Fischer called gemmae. The latter are described 
as isolated, thin-walled, one- or few-celled pieces of the trama, and 
perhaps partake of the nature of oidia. The principle burden of 
reproduction appears to fall upon these gemmae, for they are rich 
in protoplasm and germinate at once in moist situations, while the 
basidiospores rarely put forth germ tubes in Fischer’s cultures. 
Eidam (’76) and Brefeld (’77) found that in impure or badly nour¬ 
ished cultures of the spores of Nidulariaceae the young hyphae show 
a tendency to break up into oidia. 
Hymenomycetes. 
Since this group is the special object of consideration in the present 
paper, the citation of reported cases of polymorphism is as full as the 
writer has been able to make it, although it is not presumed that the 
list is complete. 
Dacryomycetaceae .— According to Brefeld (’88), Moller (’95), and 
others the basidiospores in all genera of this family germinate by 
dividing into several cells which at once produce tufts of conidia having 
more or less of the bud-cell nature. Clusters of similar spores are 
produced abundantly upon the young mycelia. In addition, Brefeld 
