Year: 1879

u, conceptacle OF ErlSYpAe c0nanau'tISi j
b, sporangium of the same highly magni-
fed. Its varieties are all known as bristle
mold, and attack kdamp paper or books;
damp specimens in the collections of our
botanists are frequently nearly ruined, and
like other fungi they are dreaded pests.
RAPID GROWTH OF FUNGI: YEAST PLANT.


Yeast is well known substance to all
housekeepers, but all do not know that it
is II plant that thrives on sugar or nitro
ganous matter. When the plant is exam
incd under the microscope it is found to
be composed of myriads Of minute cells.
about one twenty -four hundredth Of an
inch in diameter. During the progress Of
fermentation these cells rapidly increase
in number, until all the material necessa-
ry to their growth, and the evolution Of
carbonic acid gas. from such growth,
makes it convenient for the housewife TO
raise her bread She prepares her mate
rial, puts in her seed, which is some of
the spores of tho plant, either dry or in
ilod; they Immediately commence their
growth.


The cells grow together in chains, and
when stirred they sometimes appear like
threads, which are in reality bundles of
the fibers of the yeast plant.


If the yeast is not used in this condition,
the plant nourishment is soon used up,
putrcfaction commences, and with it
comes II swarm of anmalcules countless
rs they are minute, and voraoiously de-
vouring all in their way, until they also
die from want of food, changing the yeast
frequently to a mass Of animal and vege-
table putrelaction. This soon subsidies
and vinegar is the result.


This can be moro fully exempliied by
milk yeast, which sooner rs every house
wife knows, passes through its various
stages, and sometimes is not baked until
the putrescence is such rs to be hardly
endurable to many persons.


With this example of fungus growth
before their eyes, who can wonder that
the various fungi in the state of Vermont
alone cost the agricullurist many millions
of dollars? They blight the fruit trees
from the seed; they blight his grain crop
more or less every year, they blight his
fruit from blossom 10 its end, pursuing it
with determined hate; they mildew his
beans and peas; they impair his corn and
potatoes; they poison his hay, and disease
his cattle; they destroy his loved ones,
often with insidious disease, and then rot
ont his store houses, his dwelling, and
even fastening upon himself, claim him at
last as lit ground on which to ripen their
spores for deadly work on others. No
pest is so deldly, none so insidious in its
workings, none so varied, meeting us
everywhere and under almost all condi-
lions. insignificant in themselves, their
very obscurity gives them the best chances
to do us injury.


They have their enemies, countless ami
macules feed upon their various forms,
yet no family is rendered extinct. The
very atmosphere we breathe is often hazy
with the spores of various fungi. The only
wonder is, why anything or any condition
of plant or atmosphere can hold the va
rious families of fungi in check. Some
suppose them of spontaneous growth
Why is there need of such a suppositior
when the minute spores capable of pro
ducing their like cannot even be excluded
wherever the atmosphere is present! The
wonder is quite the other way, for it is 6
wonder that they don't destroy more than
they do.