l6o STUDY OF MYCOLOGY 



From this very brief survey of the development of the science 

 of mycology in general, we turn to the study of the subject in 

 America in the field and laboratory. This has been a varied his- 

 tory of field workers exploring the varied fungus flora open to 

 them in their immediate vicinity, the attempted correlation of 

 American species with their Old World congeners, and later the 

 extended description of species supposed to be new. This last, 

 until very recently, has fortunately been largely confined to a half 

 dozen workers, so that the types are, for the most part, not very 

 Avidely separated. 



Among the first collectors of fungi in the United States was 

 o o s c Louis Bosc (i 759-1 828), who collected a few species mainly from 

 South Carolina ; he described fifteen species and published figures 

 of fourteen of them in 181 1.- It is true that the erratic Rafin- 

 esque, three years previously, commenced the publication of a 

 work on the " funguses or mushroom tribes of America," but, for- 

 tunately, this was discontinued before much harm had been ac- 

 complished.! In 1813 he also published a short paper in Des- 

 vaux's Journal de Botanique. 



The first extensive study of our fungi was commenced by Lewis 

 David de Schweinitz (i 780-1 834) who published two principal 

 papers based on his collections near Salem, N. C, and Bethle- 

 hem, Pa., where he had served in the capacity of a clergyman of 

 the Lutheran church. His collections were somewhat augmented 

 by contributions from Dr. Torrey, of New York. His collection 

 is now owned by the Philadelphia Academy of Sciences, and 

 though somewhat the worse for the ravages of time, still possesses 

 much of value for the study of his type species.'! His two princi- 

 pal papers were: 



Synopsis fungorum Carolinae superioris secundum observa- 

 tiones Ludovici Davidis de Schweinitz. Edita a D. F. Schwaeg- 

 richen. Schr. der naturf. Gesell. Leipzig, i : 20-131. PI. i, 

 2. 1822. and 



rtnr{*vV<^\ ^^^ * Gesell. naturf. Freunde Mag. Berlin, 5: 83-89. PL 4-6. 

 \ t Medical Repository, 5 : 350-356 ; 356-363. 1808. 



± In addition to the Schweinitz collection, the Academy at Philadelphia 

 possesses the mycological collection of Dr. George Martin (1827-1886), 

 of West Chester, Pennsylvania ; this is specially full in certain of the groups 

 of Sphaeropsidales, together with some foreign exsiccati, among which is 

 one of the few sets of Rehm's Ascomycetes found in America. 



