REVISIONS OF CEYLON FTJNOI. 407 



Lentinus obmibilus Berk, Hooker's London Journ, Bot, 

 (1847), p. 495. 



Lentinibs mctcvlabus Berk., Hooker's London Journ. Bot. 

 (1847), p. 494. . 



This is a fairly common species ; it grows among grass, 

 developing from buried wood, usually at a depth of about a 

 foot in the soil, and coming to the surface by means of a long 

 white rhizome, which often extends obliquely through the soil 

 for some distance from its place of origin. As a rule, the 

 rhizome gives rise to only one large specimen, but it may 

 divide near the surface and produce a cluster of three or four. 

 The original specimens were sent to Berkeley by Gardner : 

 maculatiLs appears to have been separated because its stalks 

 were connate, but there is no tiling in the descriptions which 

 will dijEEerentiate between the other three. The figm'es sent by 

 Thwaites twenty years later were both assigned to stenophyllus. 

 Tliis name was most inappropriate ; the giUs are much broader 

 than in other Ceylon Lentini. 



In the unexpanded state, both the stalk and pileus, in fact 

 all the parts above ground, are black, the convex pileus being 

 covered with scattered black fibrillose scales. The veil is 

 black and remains attached in fragments to the margin. 

 Expanded specimens are, typically, inf undibulif orm , attaining 

 a diameter of 30 centimetres and a lieight of 28 centimetres, 

 I have found specimens, 11 cms, diameter, which were quite 

 plane; and many expand abnormally and are campanulate, 

 with the outer half directed almost vertically downwards. 

 The ground colour of tlie expanded pileus is ochraceous, or 

 yellow-brown, or fawn ; it is covered with blackish-brown 

 squamules, densely in the centre, more scattered and concen- 

 trically arranged elsewhere. In addition to these scales , whicji 

 are formed by the splitting of the cuticle of the pileus, there 

 is usually a regular ring of lai-ge. black, superficial, flattened, 

 polygonal warts, about midway towards the margin ; these 

 represent the remains of the veil. The flesh is white and 

 spongy, tliin in fully expanded specimens except over the 

 stalk. The margin is striato-sulcate. The stalk is sometimes 

 almost equal and about 1 to 2 cms. in diameter, but in the 

 typical form it expands upwards, measuring from 1 • 5 to 4 cms 



