1890.] NATURAL SCIENCES OF PHILADKLPIIIA. 437 



of a large number of specimens of sessile, aggregate Trichias from 

 widely separated localities. 



Exclusive of those referred to Trichia chrysosperma Rost. the 

 specimens there described, were all of one specific type possessing 

 some of the diagnostic characters of T. affinis De By. and T. Jackii 

 Rost. and yet properly referable to neither species. 



Since that paper was written, however, a type specimen of T. 

 proximeUa Karst. was obtained from Dr. Karsten by Mr. Harold 

 Wingate, through whose courtesy the speaker was enabled by com- 

 parison with that type, to refer the above series of undetermined 

 specimens to T. proximeUa with certainty. 



More recently he has examined over fifty additional specimens, 

 principally from Fairmount Park, Philadelphia, which would be 

 issued in a forthcoming century of the North Am. Fungi, E and E. 



In these he had found the same specific characters as before, the 

 elaters morphologically similar in all specimens, but the spores show- 

 ing a great variety of epispore sculpturing in the same cluster of 

 sporangia and even in the same sporangium. 



Using the figures of the spores of T. affinis and T. Jackii in 

 Rostafinski's Monograph, as convenient type illustrations, it may be 

 said that the spores in some of the sporangia of T. proximeUa show 

 raised bands or markings largely of the T. affinis type ; in others, 

 largely of the T. Jackii type ; in others, a commingling of both types, 

 in all cases these type markings being more or less associated with a 

 bewildering variety of sculptures of irregular form or of forms, 

 suggesting the outlines of the Arabic numerals or various letters of 

 the alphabet. 



These bands are perforated through their thickness with one, two 

 or three rows, or a cluster of minute cylindrical openings or pits, or 

 are sculptured into intricate plexuses of minute reticulations with 

 quadrilateral interspaces. 



In the type specimen of T. proximeUa, the spore markings ap- 

 proach the T. Jackii type. 



The elaters or threads are 4'5 // thick and provided usually with 

 foTir spirals which are closely and minutely spinulose, and connected 

 with each other by well marked and numerous interspiral filaments. 



The elaters in all the American specimens correspond morpholog- 

 ically with the type, difl^ering only in a coarser growth in some 

 cases due probably to local conditions. 



The speaker further illustrated with the microscope the relations 

 of T. proximeUa to T. Jackii, its nearest allied species. 



Through the kindness of Prof. W. G. Farlow he was enabled to 

 exhibit a type slide of T. Jackii prepared by Dr. Farlow from a 

 portion of the type specimen of Rostafinski. Considering the great 

 variability of the spore sculpturing in the two species, the spores of 

 T. Jackii do not differ specifically from those of T. proximeUa. 



The elaters, however, are more slender and otherwise not so 

 strongly developed, having few and poorly developed interspiral 



