a fungus, as proved by the examinations made by the Rev. M. J. Berkeley. It is eaten under the name of "Tuckahoe" in the United States, and as it consists almost entirely of pectic acid, it is sometimes used in the manufacture of jelly. In the Neilgherries (S. India), a substance is occasionally found which is allied to the native bread of southern latitudes. It is found at an elevation of 5,000 feet. The natives call it a little man's bread," in allusion to the tradition that the Neilgherries were once peopled by a race of dwarfs.* At first it was supposed that these were the bulbs of some orchid, but later another view was held of their character. Mr. Scott, who examined the specimens sent down to him, remarks that, instead of being the product of orchids, it is that of an underground fungus of the genus Mylitta. It indeed seems, he says, very closely allied to, if really distinct from, the so-called native bread of Tasmania.† Of the fungi employed in medicine, the first place must be assigned to ergot, which is the sclerotioid condition of a species of Claviceps. It occurs not only on rye but on wheat, and many of the wild grasses. On account of its active principle, this fungus still holds its place in the Materia Medica. Others which formerly had a reputation are now discarded, as, for instance, the species of Elaphomyces; and Polyporus officinalis, Fr., which has been partly superseded as a styptic by other substances, was formerly employed as a purgative. The ripe spongy capillitium of the great puff-ball Lycoperdon giganteum, Fr., has been used for similar purposes, and also recommended as an anodyne ; indeed formidable surgical operations have been performed under its influence, and it is frequently used as a narcotic in the taking of honey. Langsdorf gives a curious account of its employment as a narcotic; and in a recent work on Kamtschatka it is said to obtain a very high price in that country. Dr. Porter Smith writes of its employment medicinally by the Chinese, but from his own specimens it is clearly a species of Polysaccum, which he has mistaken for Lycoperdon. In China "Proceedings Agri. Hort. Soc. India" (Dec. 1871), p. lxxix. Ibid. (June, 1872), p. xxiii. several species are supposed to possess great virtue, notably the Torrubia sinensis, Tul.,* which is developed on dead caterpillars; as it is, however, recommended to administer it as a stuffing to roast duck, we may be sceptical as to its own sanitary qualities. Geaster hygrometricus, Fr., we have also detected amongst Chinese drugs, as also a species of Polysaccum, and the small hard Mylitta lapidescens, Horn. In India, a large but imperfect fungus, named provisionally Sclerotium stipitatum, Curr., found in nests of the white ant, is supposed to possess great medicinal virtues.† A species of Polyporus (P. anthelminticus, B.), which grows at the root of old bamboos, is employed in Burmah as an anthelmintic. In former times the Jew's ear (Hirneola auricula Judæ, Fr.) was supposed to possess great virtues, which are now discredited. Yeast is still included amongst pharmaceutical substances, but could doubtless be very well dispensed with. Truffles are no longer regarded as aphrodisiacs. For other uses, we can only allude to amadou, or German tinder, which is prepared in Northern Europe from Polyporus fomentarius, Fr., cut in slices, dried, and beaten until it is soft. This substance, besides being used as tinder, is made into warm caps, chest protectors, and other articles. This same, or an allied species of Polyporus, probably P. igniarius, Fr., is dried and pounded as an ingredient in snuff by the Ostyacks on the Obi. In Bohemia some of the large Polyporei, such as P. igniarius and P. fomentarius, have the pores and part of the inner substance removed, and then the pileus is fastened in an inverted position to the wall, by the part where originally it adhered to the wood. The cavity is then filled with mould, and the fungus is used, with good effect, instead of flower-pots, for the cultivation of such creeping plants as require but little moisture.§ The barren mycelioid condition of Penicillium crustaceum, * Lindley, "Vegetable Kingdom," fig. xxiv. + Currey, F., in "Linn. Trans." vol. xxiii. p. 93. 66 'Pharmacopoeia of India," p. 258. "Gard. Chron." (1862), p. 21. Fr., is employed in country districts for the domestic manufacture of vinegar from saccharine liquor, under the name of the "vinegar plant." It is stated that Polysaccum crassipes, D. C.,* is employed in the South of Europe to produce a yellow dye; whilst recently Polyporus sulfureus, Fr., has been recommended for a similar purpose. Agaricus muscarius, Fr., the flyagaric, known to be an active poison, is used in decoction in some parts of Europe for the destruction of flies and bugs. Probably Helotium æruginosum, Fr.,† deserves mention here, because it stains the wood on which it grows, by means of its diffuse mycelium, of a beautiful green tint, and the wood thus stained is employed for its colour in the manufacture of Tonbridge ware. This completes the list, certainly of the most important, of the fungi which are of any direct use to humanity as food, medicine, or in the arts. As compared with lichens, the advantage is certainly in favour of fungi; and even when compared with algæ, the balance appears in their favour. In fact, it may be questioned whether, after all, fungi do not present a larger proportion of really useful species than any other of the cryptogams; and without any desire to disparage the elegance of ferns, the delicacy of mosses, the brilliancy of some algæ, or the interest which attaches to lichens, it may be claimed for fungi that in real utility (not uncombined with injuries as real) they stand at the head of the cryptogams, and in closest alliance with the flowering plants. * Barla, "Champ. de la Nice," p. 126, pl. 47, fig. 11. V. NOTABLE PHENOMENA. THERE are no phenomena associated with fungi that are of greater interest than those which relate to luminosity. The fact that fungi under some conditions are luminous has long been known, since schoolboys in our juvenile days were in the habit of secreting fragments of rotten wood penetrated by mycelium, in order to exhibit their luminous properties in the dark, and thus astonish their more ignorant or incredulous fellows. Rumphius noted its appearance in Amboyna, and Fries, in his Observations, gives the name of Thelephora phosphorea to a species of Corticium now known as Corticium cæruleum, on account of its phosphorescence under certain conditions. The same species is the Auricularia phosphorea of Sowerby, but he makes no note of its phosphorescence. Luminosity in fungi "has been observed in various parts of the world, and where the species has been fully developed it has been generally a species of Agaricus which has yielded the phenomenon."* One of the best-known species is the Agaricus olearius of the South of Europe, which was examined by Tulasne with especial view to its luminosity.† In his introductory remarks, he says that four species only of Agaricus that are luminous appear at present to be known. One of them, A. olearius, D. C., is indigenous to Central Europe; another, A. igneus, Rumph., comes from Amboyna; the third, A. noctileucus, Lév., has been dis * M. J. Berkeley, "Introduction to Cryptogamic Botany," p. 265. ✦ Tulasne, “Sur la Phosphorescence des Champignons,” in “Ann. des Sci. Nat." (1848), vol. ix p. 338. covered at Manilla by Gaudichaud, in 1836; the last, A. Gardneri, Berk., is produced in the Brazilian province of Goyaz, upon dead leaves. As to the Dematium violaceum, Pers., the Himantia candida, Pers., cited once by Link, and the Thelephora cærulea, D. C. (Corticium cæruleum, Fr.), Tulasne is of opinion that their phosphorescent properties are still problematical; at least no recent observation confirms them. The phosphorescence of A. olearius, D. C., appears to have been first made known by De Candolle, but it seems that he was in error in stating that these phosphorescent properties manifest themselves only at the time of its decomposition. Fries, describing the Cladosporium umbrinum, which lives upon the Agaric of the olive-tree, expressed the opinion that the Agaric only owes its phosphorescence to the presence of the mould. This, however, Tulasne denies, for he writes, "I have had the opportunity of observing that the Agaric of the olive is really phosphorescent of itself, and that it is not indebted to any foreign production for the light it emits." Like Delile, he considers that the fungus is only phosphorescent up to the time when it ceases to grow; thus the light which it projects, one might say, is a manifestation of its vegetation. "It is an important fact," writes Tulasne, "which I can confirm, and which it is important to insist upon, that the phosphorescence is not exclusively confined to the hymenial surface. Numerous observations made by me prove that the whole of the substance of the fungus participates very frequently, if not always, in the faculty of shining in the dark. Among the first Agarics which I examined, I found many, the stipe of which shed here and there a light as brilliant as the hymenium, and led me to think that it was due to the spores which had fallen on the surface of the stipe. Therefore, being in the dark, I scraped with my scalpel the luminous parts of the stipe, but it did not sensibly diminish their brightness; then I split the stipe, bruised it, divided it into small fragments, and I found that the whole of this mass, even in its deepest parts, enjoyed, in a similar degree to its superficies, the property of light. I found, besides, a phosphorescence quite as brilliant in all the cap, for, |