LICE A 145 



ORDER III. 

 CRIBRARIACEJE. 



Fructification plasmodiocarpous or aethalioid, or consisting of 

 distinct sporangia ; peridia membranaceous at maturity, more 

 or less evanescent, opening irregularly or by means of a deli- 

 cate network, which involves at least the upper part of the 

 sporangium ; capillitium none. Spores of some shade of brown, 

 umbrine, rarely purplish. 



This order is distinguished by the entire absence of the capil- 

 litium, the pallid or brown spores, the gradual evolution of dis- 

 tinct sporangia in which provision for spore-dispersal is made 

 by peridial modification especially at the sporangium-top. 



Key to the Families of the Cribrariacese. 



A. Fructification plasmodiocarpous scattered as if made up of the segments 



of the plasmodial net ........ LICE^E 



B. Fructification aethalioid, the sporangia ill defined, their walls more or 



less perforate, frayed, or dissipated, forming a pseudo-capillitium, 



RETICULARIE.E 



C. Fructification aethalioid, the sporangia generally more or less tubular, 



often prismatic by mutual pressure ; opening by rupture of the apex, 

 the lateral walls entire TUBIFERE^E 



D. Fructification of distinct and separate sporangia, long stipitate, opening 



by a delicate operculum at the top . . . ORCADELLE^E 



E. Fructification of distinct and separate sporangia, the walls more or less 



reticulately perforate especially above CRIBRARIE^E 



A. LICE^E. 

 A single genus, 



l. Licea {Schrader) Rost. 



1797. Licea Schrader, Nov. Gen. Plant., p. 16, in part. 

 1873. Licea (Schrader) Rost., Mon., p. 218. 



Sporangia plasmodiocarpous, looped, irregular, or distinct, 

 sessile, and regularly rounded or elliptical ; the peridium simple, 



