THE PHALLOIDE^ OP CEYLON. . 175 



the British Museum with the remainder of his herbarium, 

 unless Berkeley retained all of them : and three of Thwaites's 

 specimens are at Peradeniya. 



At present we have at Peradeniya two recently collected 

 specimens, three dried specimens collected by Thwaites and 

 named by Berkeley, two drawings executed under Thwaites's 

 supervision, one drawing by J. G. Watson (1835), and Ber- 

 keley's illustration of 1847. In all the specimens the arms are 

 united at the apex, and the only suggestion that the arms are 

 free is in the drawing by Watson, who certainly knew least 

 about fungi of all who have seen Colus Gardneri. In the light 

 of this, we must continue to consider the species Colus. 



Is it certain that the Kew specimens are really the Ceylon 

 fungus ? How does it happen that Fischer saw the arms 

 united, whereas they are now spreading ? Assuming that these 

 are Ceylon specimens, there are two possible explanations. 

 The first explanation is that the specimens have been ex- 

 amined so often that they are now in damaged condition . The 

 second more improbable is that there are two species in Ceylon, 

 a Lysurus and a Colus, which resemble one another so closely 

 that Berkeley, Thwaites, and Gardner could not distinguish 

 them, dried or fresh. It cannot be maintained that one is the 

 immature state of the other, for one of my specimens was 

 found when just expanded, and the other when about to 

 collapse, and, moreover, the structure of the apical connection 

 negatives the idea. 



Genus 8. Aseroe, La Bill. 



Receptaculum consisting of a hollow cylindric stalk with 

 a chambered wall, crowned above by a horizontal perforated 

 disc, from the outer edge of which arise simple or longitudi- 

 nally divided arms (disc absent in A. arachnoidea) : gleba 

 when ripe surrounding the mouth of the stalk. 



1. — Aseroe rubra. La Billardiere. 



This species was described by Berkeley (Hooker's London 

 Jour. Bot., 1847, p. 512) underthe name Aseroe zeylanica, from 

 specimens and figures sent by Gardner. Thwaites refers to 

 it in his account of the Fungi of Ceylon (Jour. Linn. Soc, XIV. 



