ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY, MICROSCOPY, ETC. 355 



represent two distinct species. The conclusion is drawn that fungi are 

 more active in the breaking-up of plant remains than we had realised, 

 and that the different fungi are not able to attack plants indiscriminately, 

 but are strongly specialised in this respect. 



Sexuality in Fungi. — I. Gallaud * brings to an end his review of 

 work done on this subject. In the present contribution he describes 

 Blackmail's and Christman's work on Uredinere, and contrasts their 

 results with Maire's work on the Basidiomycetes. Dangeard and Sapin- 

 Trouffy consider the fusion of nuclei in the basidium and the teleutospore 

 to be fertilisation, analogous with that of the higher plants. Maire, 

 on the contrary, considers that this fusion is comparable to chromatic 

 reduction, and is in no sense sexual fusion. 



A. Guilliermond f begins a review of recent work on the same subject 

 in the Ascomycetes. Among the hemiasci he quotes from work done by 

 Mile. Popta on Protomyces and Ascoidea ; the latter she retains among 

 the hemiasci, the former belongs rather to the Phycomycetes. The 

 results and theories of Dangeard, Juel, Barker, Ikeno, and Kuyper are 

 also considered. They studied different members of this troublesome 

 group, the point in dispute being the nature of the spore capsule, 

 whether it is to be regarded as a sporangium or an ascus. Dangeard 

 connects the hemiasci with the Chytridiaceae, which he regards as the 

 ancestors of the Ascomycetes, the latter being derived from the sexual 

 sporangium, while the hemiasci have arisen from the asexual sporangium. 

 Juel removes Taphridium from the Exoascea3, and places it also among 

 the hemiasci ; the so-called ascus of this genus develops similarly to the 

 sporangium of Protomyces. Monascus, an allied genus, has been placed 

 by Kuyper in a new group of Endoasceas on account of the formation 

 of asci in the interior of the oogonium. 



Notes on American Fungi. f — W. G. Farlow found growing in 

 Vermont, and now describes as Tremella reticulata, a fungus previously 

 published as a Gorticium. From a solid gelatinous base there rose to 

 the height of 3 inches or more masses of white jelly ; branches arose 

 from a common base, anastomosing below, reticulated, and becoming 

 free upwards ; he found in it the typical Tremella basidia and spores. 

 Further notes are given on Synchytrium pluriannulatum and Puccini- 

 astrum arcticum. 



Mycological Notes. § — C. G. Lloyd has recently issued a number of 

 papers bearing on the larger fungi. In Nos. 29 and 30 he discusses 

 some Phalloids and some of the Polyporea3, notably Fomes niyricans, 

 as he finds that two plants are included under that name. The second 

 paper deals with further examples of Phalloids and Lycoperdons. A 

 third paper is devoted to a consideration of the Nidulariaceae, with 

 plates 102-11 ; descriptions of the genera and species are given. A 

 beginning has been made with the study of the Polyporese, and Lloyd 

 gives us " Polyporoid issue, No. 1," containing a number of forms of 



* Rev. Gen. Bot., xix. (1907) pp. 556-9 (6 figs). 



t Op. cit., xx. (1908) pp. 32-9 (12 figs.). 



\ Coutrib. Crypt. Lab. Harvard Univ., lxv. (1907) 17 pp. 



§ Mycological Notes, Cincinnati, Jan. and Feb. 1908. 



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