M. C. COOKE OX NETTLE STEMS AND THEIR MICRO-FUNGI. 71 



great number of hyaline, sausage-shaped spores, sometimes straight, 

 but often curved, containing one or two nuclei, and furnished at 

 the extremity with a delicate, hair-like aj^pendage. This appen- 

 dage to the spores is the chief feature wliich distinguishes the 

 genus Dinemasporiiim from Excipida, and both are very mucli like 

 hispid Pezizce with naked spores, or spores not contained in asci. 

 Whether this is sufficient in itself to justify the maintenance of 

 two genera is very doubtful ; in fact, so are all generic distinctions 

 founded solely on slight differences in the character of the spores. 

 It might be urged with equal justice that Valsa taleola should be 

 constituted a member of a new genus distinct from that which 

 includes Valsa leiphemia, because of the similar hyaline appen- 

 dages to the spores of the former which are absent in the latter. 

 Hereafter it may possibly be demonstrated that the majority of 

 species now included under Dinemasjoorium and Excipula, as well 

 as Solenia and Cyphella^ are conditions of Pezizoid fungi, 



a The sooty black patches on old nettle stems which 



^ are so common in spring are Torula herharum. This 

 i^ is a very good example of a large genus (fig. 2), having 

 much external resemblance to the black moulds, but 

 structurally belonging to the Coniomycetes. The whole 

 fructifying surface is exposed, and m this particular 

 instance looks exceedingly like a patch of soot sjjrinkled on the 

 rotting stems, it may be a quarter of an inch, or it may be two or 

 three inches in length. A little of this sooty fungus examined 

 carefully with a power equal to three hundred diameters, will reveal 

 innumerable threads of dark sub-globose spores attached to each 

 other in a moniliform manner, like strings of beads, but if a drop 

 of water touches them all these spores separate from each other, 

 without a trace of their mode of growth, and in that condition it 

 would be exceedingly difficult to determine the genus or order to 

 which the fungus belongs. 



Another fungus belonging to the same order, and with a similar 

 structure, has also been found on nettle stems in the month of 

 October. This is Septonema elongatispora. The threads in this 

 instance also consist of spores attached end to end as in Torula^ 

 but, instead of being simple, the spores are cylindrical, with one or 

 two septa, and quite colourless. The tufts are effused over the stems, 

 giving them a whitish mouldy appearance, very different to the sooty 

 patches of Torula, and more like those of Dendryphium griseum. 



