CLUSTER-CUPS. 5 



Coniomycetes, from two Greek words, meaning 

 " dust-fungi." This group or family includes 

 several smaller groups, termed orders, which are 

 analogous to the natural orders of flowering plants. 

 Without staying to enumerate the characteristics 

 of these orders, we select one in which the spores 

 are enclosed in a distinct peridium, as in our typical 

 plant they are contained within the cups. This 

 order is the JEcidiacei, so called after JEcidium, the 

 largest and most important of the genera included 

 within this order. 



The JEcicliacei are always developed on living 

 plants, sometimes on the flowers, fruit, petioles, or 

 stems, but most commonly on the leaves : occa- 

 sionally on the upper surface, but generally on the 

 inferior. The different species are distributed over 

 a wide area; many are found in Europe and North 

 America, some occur in Asia, Africa, and Australia. 

 When the cryptogamic plants of the world shall 

 have been as widely examined and as well under- 

 stood as the phanerogamic plants have been, we 

 shall be in a better position to determine the 

 geographical distribution of the different orders of 

 fungi. In the present incomplete state of our 

 knowledge, all such efforts will be unsatisfactory. 



But to return to the goatsbeard, and its cluster- 

 cups. The little fungus is called JEcidium trago- 

 pogonis, the first being the name of the genus, and 

 the last that of the species. Let us warn the young 

 student against falling into the error of supposing 



