WHITE: THE NIDULARIACEAE OF NorTH AMERICA 273 
ments, opening more or less irregularly by the breaking away or 
falling to pieces of the walls at maturity, having no true epi- 
phragm : sporangioles enveloped in mucus and not attached in any 
way to the inner surface of the peridium. 
The history of the genus Granularia, though not as long as 
that of the first two genera belonging to this family, appears to have 
become more involved and complicated, very probably owing to 
the fact that the species of Granu/aria are as a rule, rarer, and less 
conspicuous than the species of Cyathia and Crucibulum. Micheli * 
in 1729 figured “ Cyathoides scutellatum,’ which is unquestionably 
a true Granularia, and the reason why this species has since been 
placed under Cyathus by Roth? and later by Tulasne, it hard 
to understand. Micheli, in writing of this genus, says “ [fructus] 
vel prope centrum, vel ad circumferentiam brevissimo pediculo 
seu umbilicali funicolo firmantur,”’ but of the figure of three spor- 
angioles of “ Cyathoides scutellatum”’ only one has a short lateral 
attachment, and that much shorter than in the figures of the spor- 
angioles of the three other species represented. Fries { says of 
his second division, which contains true Granularia, that the spor- 
angioles have no umbilicus or umbilical thread, but are attached by 
the margin. Tulasne writes that notwithstanding these authorities, 
the lateral position of a funiculus seems very problematical in the 
genus Cyathia, and that the sporangioles of the specimens of Gran- 
ularia which he has studied do not adhere any more by the edge 
than by any other point, either to the mucilage in which they are 
‘mmersed or to the peridium. This idea must have arisen from 
the fact that the mucus contiguous to the walls of the peridium 
dries up a little quicker than that in the center of the cup and for 
this reason, several sporangioles appear to be fixed by their outer 
margin, while they are still loose in the center of the cup. But 
this does not explain why “ scutellaris” has been made a species 
of Cyathia, 
No other writer seems to have mentioned this plant after 
Micheli until 1 791, when Roth described a new genus Granularia, 
as follows: « Fungus subrotundus, granis mucilagine immersis 
ot. PL Gen. 225 
: i ~ I. FOR. fig 1725. 
T Roth, Cat. Bot. 1: 237. 1797. 
tSyst. Myc. 2: 300. 1822. 
