434 FETCH : 



was formerly attributed to Eosellinia radiciperda Mass. ; it 

 differs from the latter species, which has not been found in 

 Ceylon, in the shape and size of the perithecia and spores. In 

 some cases it originates on Grevillea or Symplocos and spreads 

 by means of its rayceUum to the stems and roots of tea bushes, 

 but it can also originate in heaps of dead leaves, or on dead 

 logs, and spread to the tea or Panax from there. Its dissemi- 

 nation through the tea estates is brought about by the conidia ; 

 these are always present in abundance, but the perithecia 

 are found only rarely. Thwaites' specimens are not locaKzed. 

 It occurs on tea estates from Peradeniya upwards {i.e., above 

 1,500 ft.) ; I have developed the perithecia from material 

 collected on a tea estate at Peradeniya, and have gathered 

 them from a dead jungle tree at Hakgala. There is no doubt 

 that it is a native, not an introduced, species. 



65. — Rosellinia bunodes (B. & Br.) Sacc. 



Sphceria (Byssisedce) bunodes B. & Br., Fungi of Ceylon, 

 No. 1088, Journ. Linn. Soc, XIV., p. 125. 



Perithecia densely crowded, embedded at first in pm^ple- 

 brown mycelium, superficial, brownish-black, globose, up to 

 1*6 mm. diameter, carbonaceous, verrucose with close-set, 

 somewhat pyramidal warts arranged more or less concentri- 

 cally ; ostiolum sometimes papillate, sometimes not elevated ; 

 wall of perithecium thin, brittle, about 0*1 mm. thick, black 

 internally. 



Spores, 80-110 x 1-12 n, cymbiform, or sometimes lanceo- 

 late, ends acute and produced into a thread-Hke point which 

 in the longer spores may reach a length of 25 /i, brownish-black, 

 opaque. Asci not seen. 



Berkeley and Broome's figure of the conidiophore is some- 

 what imaginary : it is of the usual Graphiuni type, much 

 branched at the apex, as in Rosellinia bothrina. The peri- 

 thecia have been refound recently at Peradeniya, on sticks 

 in a rubbish heap ; these agree in all points with the type 

 specimens in Herb. Peradeniya. It has only been found 

 saprophytic in Ceylon, though it has been recorded as parasitic 

 on Coffea in Southern India. 



