1867.1 123 [Kneeland. 



Coleoptera mentioned as having been found affected with any parasitic 

 fungus. 



Mr. C. J. Sprague has examined the fungus, and pronounced it to 

 belong to the genus Cordyceps, one of the modern divisions of the 

 old and extensive genus Sphceria ; his observations on the specimen 

 will be found below. 



The fungus resembles much that figured on plate 3, fig. 3 of Mr. 

 Gray's monograph, though the caterpillar in that instance belonged to 

 the nocturnal Lepkloptera and not to the Coleoptera, and was of much 

 smaller size. It must be very rare, as none of the natives or foreign 

 residents had ever noticed anything of the kind before. 



The body of this specimen, it will be noticed, appears filled with 

 the fungus, and it has burst out in six different places, from the head 

 to the tail, in filaments about one and a half inches long. The fungus 

 IS perfect, except that it had not gone on to fructification, and can not 

 therefore be described as to its species. It is probably not a new spe- 

 cies ; but the insect and the habitat have not been, as far as I can as- 

 certain, before indicated as the basis and locality of a fungus gi-owth. 

 The specimen I present to the Society. Mr. Sprague's remarks on 

 the specimen are as follows : 



One familiar with mycology will see in the fungus you send me 

 only one of a vast number of immature growths, which not only puz- 

 zle the most learned in such matters, but are absolutely unrecogniza- 

 ble, until they reach fruition. 



What is a species, what is a genus in mycology ? You may com- 

 prehend the difficulty in answering this question when I say that, in all 

 probability, not half of the recorded species of fungi, nor of the gen- 

 era, even, are autonomous. Genera, which have stood in print for a 

 century, are now found to be immature, non-developed forms of 

 other genera totally dissimilar. One group of fungi produces fruit, or 

 rather reproduces itself in seven distinct ways, and it was only when 

 these protean forms had been laboriously traced into each other that 

 the truth was discovered. Isaria, Sijcogale, Stilbum, alluded to by 

 Mr. Gray, are not autonomous plants. They are supposed to be pe- 

 culiar, non-developed forms of ascoid fungi. I have no belief, myself, 

 that the fungi infesting insects are at all peculiar to them. Isaria 

 occurs on various things, as indeed do both the other genera. They 

 all infest decaying matter. The genus Sphceria is wonderfully dis- 

 tributed. There are certainly peculiar forms which have only been 

 found on insects. But I am not at all prepared to say that the Isaria 

 may not develop into Sphceria under favorable circumstances. These 

 things are so strange in their growth, that a certain form may for cen- 

 turies never appear as other than a warty excrescence, never produc- 



