9 



ated margins, forming, by their oblique anastomosing, areolations 

 which are nearly always quite regularly pentagonal. Stipe hollow, elas- 

 tic, cylindrical, tapering towards the base, abruptly rounded at the apex 

 and strongly constricted at its junction with the capitulum. Hymen- 

 ium olive-brown (ochreous yellow when dried in a thin stratum on 

 paper.) Spores obtusely elliptical, .0001' {.003 mm.) long. Plants 

 from 3 to 5 inches high ; stipe six lines to one inch in diameterat the 

 broadest part. Color deep fleshy red, bordering on vermilion in the 

 capitulum, and paler towards the base of the stipe. The odor emit- 

 ted by the sporiferous mass is a peculiar and indescribable one and can 

 be best compared to that of Corynites Ravenelii—\\Qa.MY and slightly 

 nauseous, but not fetid. Shortly after the fungi are gathered, and 

 especially while they are being dried, the smell, at a short distance, 

 is not unlike that of benzoic acid. 



Habitat. Among grasses in open places, in various parts of Asto- 

 ria, Long Island. 



My attention was called to this fungus by the 



Wash 



Rodman, who showed me last August, a colored drawing of it made 

 by Miss Trask for her father, Dr. James B. Trask, its discoverer. 

 Having subsequently received fresh specimens of the plant itself from 

 both Mr. Rodman and Mr. Wra. B. Halsey, I recognized it as a spe- 

 cies of Simblum—z. remarkable addition to our American flora, inas- 

 much as the genus has hitherto been considered as exclusively a 

 tropical one. Of the species which have been described, Simbliitn 

 feriphragmoides Klotzsch, the large, robust species, on which the 

 genus was founded, occurs in the Mauritius Islands ; S. gracile 

 Berk, (for a description of which I am indebted to Prof. W. G. Far- 

 low) is found in Ceylon ; 5. flavescens Kurtz, in Java ; and S. pih- 

 diatum Ernst., and S. sphaerocephalum Schlecht., in South America, 

 A comparison of the species under consideration with the original 

 descriptions and figures as given by the authors of the foregoing, 

 showed it to be quite distinct, not only as regards form but also as 

 to color and other characteristics. Of the species just mentioned, 

 the first and second are pale yellow ; the third sulphur yellow; the 

 fourth white ; and the fifth, although described by Schlechtendal as 

 *i more of a brick than of a flesh-red," is figured as a brownish yel- 

 low Oi \hQ%Q ^wc^^^, Simbhm rubescens is most nearly related to 

 S sphaerocephalum, but diff-ers in the form of the upper part of the 

 stipe; in the bright red color, which is deeper m the receptacle ; in 

 the color of the hymenium; in the odor emitted by the sponferous 

 mass, which does not, as Schlechtendal expresses it stmk furch er- 

 lich," but is merely slightly nauseous ; and in the shape of the volva 

 the lobes of which, after bursting, expand very widely and form a 

 very shallow cup, to the centre of which is affixed the stipe by its 

 exceedingly narrowed base. The plants are solitary and make t er 

 ^ppearanL'after the rains of Summer and Autumn J^e -pmd 

 as it bursts from the volva, always carries up with it a ^mall piece of 

 the latter temporarily attached to its upper s^^^^^^'/^. ^oes 5. gra- 

 cile according to Mr. Berkeley, tn his description and figure of that 

 species A section of the stipe shows that it is composed of three 

 kye s of elongated chambers or cells, the thick lateral walls of which, 



