198 Rhodora [AvGUsT 
acquaintance of the genus, and then through the kindness of a' friend, 
who showed him the delicate pinkish gray P. coprophilus Peck grow- 
ing on a heap of street sweepings by the side of the boulevard in 
Allston, Massachusetts. A second species, P. expansus Peck, 
appeared near the laboratory of the Alstead School in late July, 1902, 
and gave material for a few notes. 
'The genus Pluteolus is closely similar to the more familiar Pluteus. 
The free gills, fibrous-cartilaginous stem, and absence of veil or 
ring, make the two genera easy of recognition, and the brown spores 
of the former quickly distinguish it from the rosy-spored Pluteus. 
Pluteolus expansus, Peck, the species observed in Alstead, New 
Hampshire, is not a good example of the genus. In fact its author! 
placed it originally under Galera. Twenty years later,? in a revision 
of the species of the genus growing in the State of New York, he 
transferred it to Pluteolus, remarking: 
“The species has been removed to this genus because of the vis- 
cidity of the pileus, nevertheless it must be confessed?that such a 
feature is scarcely satisfactory for generic distinction." Moreover, 
the gills, as he also notes, are slightly attached. 
Examination of the Alstead specimens showed a stronger reason 
for this transfer, in the relation of the stipe to the pileus. The sub- 
stance of the two is plainly not homogeneous, a characteristic empha- 
sized by Fries? in establishing for the Pluteoli a separate (sub-) 
genus. À 
The Alstead plants showed themselves after rain in grassy ground, 
near horse droppings. The viscid, greenish yellow caps, elevated on 
long slender stems, white, tinged with yellow, announced a novelty at 
first sight. When the plants were fresh and moist the color was 
charming in its delicacy, As they dried, the greenish tint faded, 
and gave place at last to grayish yellow or brown. There was scarcely 
any substance to the caps, except at the centre. They were trans- 
lucently thin, long and deeply striate, the attenuated margin, from a 
side view, appearing gracefully arched between the attachments of 
1 Peck: 26th Report of the N. Y. State Museum, p. 58. 
2ib.: 46th Report, p. 60. 
3 Fries: Hymenomycetes Europaei, p. 266, “ Pileus carnosulus, viscidus .... 
Stipes subcartilagineus, ab hymenophoro discretus. Lamellae rotundato-liberae om- 
nino Pluteorum. Ob has notas necesse videtur Pluteolos peculiare subgenus cen- 
sere, inter Hyporhodios Pluteis analogum.” 
