The Phalloideae of Ceylon. 



BY 



T. FETCH. 



n^HE earliest records of the fungi of any country usually 

 -^ include some mention of its phalloids, since the bizarre 

 forms of this group cannot fail to attract the attention of the 

 most casual observer. Hence it happens that, considering the 

 relatively small number of species, we probably know more 

 about the occurrence of this family than of any other. At the 

 same time it may be said that we know very little about the 

 species recorded : they do not lend themselves to easy preserva- 

 tion, either dry or in liquid preservatives, and therefore the 

 descriptions and figures of many species illustrate chiefly the 

 imaginative power of the describer. There is no doubt that 

 far more names than species of phalloids are in existence. 

 In many cases species have been founded on only a single , 

 specimen, without any idea of the variations which occur 

 within the species. 



Five Ceylon species were collected by Gardner in 1844, and 

 were described by Berkeley (Hooker's London Journal, 1847). 

 Three of them were considered new species, viz., Aseroe 

 zeylanica, Berk. , Simblum gracile, Berk. , and Lysurus Gardner i, 

 Berk. : the remaining two were attributed to Dictyophora 

 dcemonum, Rumph., and Glathrus cancellatus, L. The Aseroe 

 and the Simblum, however, are only forms of previously 

 known species, while, on the other hand, the Glathrus has been 

 considered to differ from G. cancellatus. 



From Thwaites's collections, made between 1863 and 1868, 

 Berkeley identified all the five species previously collected by 

 Gardner, in addition to a new species, Glathrus delicatus, which 

 has not been recorded from any other country. The five were 

 listed under the same names as before, though Thwaites had 

 considered that his large Glathrus was not G. cancellatus, and 

 AnnalB of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Peradeniya, Vol. IV., Part IV., Dec, 1908. 



