218 Prof. G. de Notaris on the Tribe Spbseriace^. 



but from having too often preferred characters more ready of 

 access to those of internal structure, and trivial differences to the 

 organs of fructification, they led students astray from the analytic 

 method formerly adopted by the immortal Micheli, who, assisted 

 by the power of their own minds, would otherwise have guided 

 them by a surer and more noble path. The works of Micheli 

 were often consulted, but his observations were either carelessly 

 passed over or considered incomprehensible, and we have seen 

 several of our contemporaries advance facts as new which had 

 abeady been published in the ' Nova Plantarum Genera.^ 



Of all the divisions of the mycological kingdom, that of the 

 Pyrenomycetes or Hypoxyla especially appears to me most stri- 

 kingly to prove what I have above asserted. Analyse the works 

 of Persoon, Fries, Duby, Wallroth and Chevalier, and you will 

 find the form and colours of the perithecia, the way in which they 

 open, the mode in which they burst from the matrix, the stroma, 

 the colour, the consistence of the nucleus, accurately described ; 

 but of the parts of which the nucleus itself is composed, of the 

 parts in which the essential and classical characters really reside, 

 of the fructification, of the internal structure of the conceptacula, 

 there is no intimation whatever, or they give them joined to the 

 others as of secondary importance and out of mere compliment. 



Thus it is that in this family myriads of errors and contradic- 

 tions are met with at every step. We find, for example, some 

 species of Sphaeria placed among the Cytisporce, because the nu- 

 cleus bursts from the perithecium in the form of a tendril j to 

 Lophium we find pulverulent sporidia assigned, because they are 

 thread-shaped and equal in length to the asci. Among the 

 Spharia we find species which have the nucleus composed of 

 sporidia only — species which belong to Sphceronema, and in short 

 true Pezizce, because in colour, form, and mode of growth they 

 present the semblance of a perithecium. 



Among the general characters of Fries^ sections of the im- 

 mense genus Sphceria, based principally and sometimes with 

 useless details on the existence or want of a stroma, or on the 

 mode in which the perithecia are disposed, we certainly find the 

 asci and sporidia mentioned, but the sporidia in the same sections 

 differ immensely in the several species in form, structure or size. 

 We find allied species dispersed in different sections or even iden- 

 tical species, solely from their having attacked vegetables of dif- 

 ferent families or parts of different duration. 



I do not hesitate to assert this, having had the advantage of 

 procuring an authentic copy of the entire collection of the Scle- 

 romycetes Suecici of Fries, possessing also the greater part of the 

 types published in the ' Fasciculi ' of the enlightened Prof. Kunze, 

 those illustrated by Montague in his 'Notice sur les Plantes 



