236 Mr. Gould on two new Trogons, 



of the same genus. In Ascobolus, it is the asci themselves which 

 are ejected. 



The Discomycetes, which Corda still keeps amongst the species of 

 the following family, but which M. Leveille, like Fries, separates 

 from them under the name of Thecospori, have a receptacle composed 

 of cells which are sometimes polyhedrons and rounded, sometimes 

 more or less elongated, which, by their contiguity or various inter- 

 lacing, give to the tissue which results from them a very varied con- 

 sistence. They grow on the earth, or wood and leaves in the course 

 of decomposition. Their vegetation is centripetal, as in Pyrenomy- 

 cetes, with which many tribes were not long since confounded. 

 There is, however, this essential difference, that the receptacle, 

 though at first it may have been closed, at length opens and becomes 

 discoid. Their normal form is then that of a cup ; but if we suppose 

 that this cup, in a high grade of development, should become re- 

 versed, we shall have the mitre-like form of Helvella, the pileate or 

 hemispherical shape of Leotia, or finally, that of capitate in Mor- 

 chella. 



Many species amongst the Morels and Helvellae are eatable*. Some 

 are adorned with the brightest colours, and are the pride of our 

 forests. It is to the beauty of Peziza coccinea that Persoon attri- 

 buted his study of Fungi, as he himself assured me. These fungi 

 are generally European ; many, however, occur in the southern parts 

 of the new world, for they belong chiefly to the temperate zones. 

 This is especially true of HelvellcB, for we possess many Pezizce from 

 tropical America, and have one to describe from Cuba. 

 [To be continued.] 



XXIX. — On two new species of Trogon and a new species of 

 Toucan from the Cordillerian Andes. By John Gould, 

 Esq., F.L.S., &c. 



To the Editors of the Annals of Natural History, 

 Gentlemen, 

 Aware of the extensive circulation of your valuable Journal 

 amon^ scientific men both at home and abroad, and conse- 

 quently of its importance as a means of making known new 

 species in the various branches of the delightful science to 

 which its pages are devoted, I beg to enclose for insertion in 

 it the specific characters and descriptions of two new Trogons 

 and a new Toucan, neither of which have appeared in my il- 

 lustrated Monographs of those groups ; figures of them will 

 however shortly be published in my ^ Icones Avium.^ 



* During many months of the year the staple food of the Fuegians is a 

 fungus of this family, figured by Darwin, and to which, in a paper read be- 

 fore the Linnaean Society, I have given the name of Cyttaria, It is allied 

 to Bulgaria, with the form of Sphesria concentrica, and honey- comb appear- 

 ance of a Morel. — M. J. B. 



