History of the Fungi of the Rimini Territory

10

...until the third day of October, it was drizzling. On the Nones of this month, I approached the place and found small fungi born. I observed the roots with the naked eye; they were branched and arched. The stalks were whitish, the caps the size of a grain of millet, and they were globose and made of a greenish mucous matter. Having most diligently replaced them, three days later I approached the place again and, with the greatest indignation of spirit, found everything eaten by insects. I attempted the same things elsewhere, but I always consumed all my labor and industry in vain. Hence, I strongly approve of what Micheli asserts when he says: original: "innumeros pene casus observasse, per quos contingit vel eosdem Fungos non nasci, vel eruptionem praevertere, vel protrahere, seu majori, vel minori copia progigni." He has observed almost countless cases through which it happens that the same fungi are either not born, or the eruption is anticipated or prolonged, or they are produced in greater or lesser abundance. What, therefore, shall I propose to the friendly reader that he should think from these things which I myself had observed? Truly, nothing certain. For the small fungi that I saw born were indeed similar to each other, but not one of them agreed in form with the fungus from which I had taken the seeds. For this one had no roots, but a mass of mold was substituted for them; those ones certainly abounded in roots. This one was entirely whitish; those ones bore a greenish cap. Wherefore, no one fails to see that if, for example, an asparagus were to arise from a vetch seed, and vice versa, a prudent physicist would never deduce: therefore, vetch and asparagus arise from a peculiar seed.

Finally, we received from the illustrious Johannes Franciscus Seguierius, Vol. I of the Plantae Veronenses Plants of Verona, page 13, that original: "Johannem Gottlieb Gleditschium in Epicriseos Siegesbeckianae Consideratione in Linnaei Systema Plantarum sexuale, Michelii experimenta, circa Fungorum originem, a se repetita foelici exitu, commemorare." Johannes Gottlieb Gleditsch, in his Consideration of the Siegesbeckian Epicrisis on Linnaeus's Sexual System of Plants, mentions that Micheli's experiments regarding the origin of fungi were repeated by him with a happy outcome. For this reason, I obtained Gleditsch's short work so that I might read in the source what I had received cited by Seguierius, where I found in abundance what I had long desired to know. For he says on page 59: original: "Quantum enim per me licuit potiora perquisivi, reiteravi, femina vidi, eaque debita arte ad propagandum occultavi, & eventus intentioni ubique fecit satis, ut aliis propterea, quorum examen mihi adhuc superest, pleniorem interdum fidem vix detrabam, & Cl. Auctori Micheliana Opera proinde valdopere commendem." For as much as was allowed to me, I sought out the better things, I repeated them, I saw the seeds, and I hid them with the due art for propagation, and the event everywhere satisfied the intention, so that for others, the examination of which still remains for me, I might at times hardly withhold fuller faith, and I therefore greatly commend the Michelian works to the illustrious author. To add at last another experiment, almost known even to gardeners of the lowest rank, which succeeds most certainly without trouble or difficulty: If, for example, water impregnated with the seeds of Agarics, Boleti, Hydnae, etc. (obtained by the careful washing of the finely cut caps of the same fungi) is poured upon the surface of moderately warming manure, a supply of fungi of THE SAME SPECIES, whose seeds had been expended for this business, bursts forth shortly after. See how, by the most learned man Gleditsch, who...