On Molecular and Microscopic Science, Volume 1 (of 2)Somerville, Mary
History
On Molecular and Microscopic Science, Volume 1 (of 2)
Somerville, Mary
Matter -- Constitution; Microscopy; Natural history
Although there cannot be a doubt of the existence of the Uredines as a
numerous natural family, M. Tulasne considers the species of certain
genera to be only secondary forms of certain genera of Pucciniæ. Many of
these minute fungi have a third and even a fourth order of fruit; the
principle being carried to a maximum in the order Cæomacei. These
entophytes have a delicate mycelium, which gives rise to short or
obsolete fertile threads, terminated by single spores or chains of
spores. These spores when they germinate produce a second order of
spores; these occasionally produce a third order, and so on successively
even to a fourth or a fifth order. It is always the last and smallest
spores which reproduce the plant. The object of the successive orders
seems to be to diminish the size of the spores and to increase their
number, that they may more easily enter the stomates of the plants they
live upon, and be more easily and widely dispersed by the winds.
The Uredo candida, or Cystopus candidus, which takes its name from the
white spot it forms on the leaves of the cabbage and other vegetables,
is found to produce both female or germ cells and spermatozoids. Long
before the white spot is formed on the leaf, the presence of the
abundant spawn may be perceived by swellings and deformities in the
victim plant. Its filaments, which creep exclusively in the
intercellular canals of the cellular tissue, are tubular, of unequal
diameter, and exceedingly branched, and are always formed of cellulose,
either thick-walled and gelatinous, or thin-walled and membranous. From
this mycelium, little threads hang down, ending in globular vesicles
containing a nearly homogeneous colourless matter, and ultimately an
aqueous liquid; they are supposed to fix the mycelium to the cells of
the victim. According to the examination of Mr. Berkeley, M. Tulasne,
and others, the branches of the mycelium accumulate in a hollow
immediately under the white spot in the skin of the leaf of the plant
attacked. From these branches spring bundles of club-shaped tubes,
directed perpendicularly towards the upper skin of the leaf, and forming
a tuft or little cushion of variable extent. The summit of each of these
club-shaped tubes is formed into a conidium, or spore dust cell, which
separates itself from that below it by taking a globular form. In the
upper end of the remainder of the tubes, new spore dust cells are
formed, and so on indefinitely. These conidia remain attached to one
another in a string by slender constrictions which become thinner, and
at last give way from above downwards, and they escape in succession
through a crack in the skin of the leaf. The quantity of spores that are
generated by the dense mass of these club-shaped tubes must be enormous.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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