FAGUS ANTARCTICA OF FORSTER. 147 
This interesting Spheria belongs to the series Hypocrea 
of the tribe Poronia, and is allied to Spheria Pocula, Fr.; 
resembling at first sight Spheria.rufa: The form however 
is constant, and the perithecia entirely confined to the disc. 
I regret that I can give no further analysis, the sporidia and 
asci being imperfect, -L have seen only a few specimens ; but 
as far as I can judge from them, the stroma seems to burst 
through the bark, and is at length left free upon the wood. 
Tan. V.— Fig. 1. a, Lentinus fasciatus: nat, size.—b. Sec- 
tion of do. : inis ad 
Fig. 2.—a. Spheria semi-orbis: nat, size.—b. b. Section 
of ditto, magnified.—c. Portion of section; highly magnified. 
VIIL —On the Facus ANTARCTICA of Forster, and some other 
species of Beech of the Southern Hemisphere ; by Sır W. J. 
Hooker. 
[Tazs. VI. VIL VIIL]. 
Or the Fagus antarctica of Forster, nothing seems to have 
been published, except the few notes of that author in the 
** Comment. Goett. LX. p. 24,” and those given by Willdenow; 
butto both these botanists the flowers and fruit were unknown. 
Mirbel, in his ** Description de quelques espéces nouvelles de la 
Jamille des Amentacées," in the 14th vol. of the Mémoires du 
Muséum d' Histoire Naturelle, has taken some pains, at page 
469, to prove that his Fagus betuloides, is distinct from it, 
judging from Forster's description; and at p. 472 of the same 
volume, where he enumerates the known species of Beech, 
he says, ** Je ne cite le Fagus antarctica de Forster, parceque 
la description ne dit rien de la fleur femelle, qui, jusqu' à 
présent, n'est pas connue." In my Herbarium, amongst the 
plants collected by the officers of Capt. King’s Voyage, in H. M. 
Ships Adventure and Beagle, sent to survey the southern 
extremity of South America, Terra del Fuego, &c., is a 
specimen of what I conceive to be Forster's plant, gathered _ 
in the Straits of Magalhaens, and it is no doubt the species c 
