22 5 THE .TOUlfXAL OF BOTANY' 



whole an excellent proluction ; the last volume did not appear until 

 18J5. Unt'ortunatelj throu^-h faulty arrangement the whole of the 

 flora was not treated ; the Basidiomycetes occupied much more than 

 half the volumes, the Diseomycetes one volume ; the Hyphomycetes 

 received rather sc.mty treatment. This was the last attempt to write 

 a complete British Fungus Flora, 



About the year 1832 Massee worked for some time in the Botanical 

 Department of the British Museum, which acquired from him his 

 v.iluable series of original fungus paintings. He was employed 

 principally in preparing tlie exhibition stands of microfungi in the 

 general gallery, a work which was afterwards completed (and almost 

 entirely done) by Miss Lorrain Smith. J3.itters was working in the 

 Department at the time and he and Massee acquired the quarterly 

 publication GrevUlea which Cooke had managed for the previous 

 twenty years, Massee acted as editor from 1892 to 1891 (vols, xxi., 

 xxii.), after which it ceased to appear. 



When Cooke retired from Kew, Massee was appointed Principal 

 Assistant for Cryptogams. He now applied himself more thoroughly 

 to the study of plant diseases and in 1899 published his most successful 

 book — a Text Book of Plant Diseases, — which ran through three 

 editions and was replaced in 1910 b}'^ his more ambitious Diseases of 

 Cultivated Plants and Trees. His practical experience of farming 

 helped him greatly in understanding the conditions under which 

 diseases are most likely to cause losses, but many of the ideas ex- 

 pressed in the later book are not generally accepted. He produced a 

 very useful book — European Fungus Flora : Agaricacece — in 1902, 

 and in 190o collaborated with the late Charles Crossland in the 

 Fungus Flora of Yorkshire. He attended the annual forays of 

 the Yorkshire Naturalists' Union for many years: it was tlirou^h 

 his enthusiasm and ha'-d work that the Mycological Committee, bf 

 which he was chairman, came into existence. The British Mycological 

 Society was formed at the Halifax meeting in 189(3 and Massee was 

 elected as first president ; the large number of records in the flora for 

 the Scarljorough district indicate the extent of his collecting. 



In 190G aj)peared his Text Book of Fungi — a Avork which, though 

 somewhat scrappy, contains much valuable information. His British 

 Fungi and Lichens (illustrated by his daughter Ivy, to whom I am 

 indel)ted for many of the facts contained in this notice), which apjjeared 

 in 1911, is a remarkal)ly cheap and useful work : the title is misleading, 

 as lichens are merely mentioned. His last book. Mildews, Busts and 

 Insects, written in collaboration with his daughter, did not add to his 

 rei)utation. He wrote in all about two hundred and flfty articles 

 on fungi. 



Massee had a world-wide nqnitation as a mycologist. During the 

 years he studied the various groups he had acquired a knowledge of 

 fungi practically unrivalled. But though brilliant he was often 

 careless ; if he had had any capacity for taking ])ains he would 

 liave been a genius. He had a clear mind, and was regardless of 

 authority : the latter trait he carried to excess and often totally dis- 

 regarded results which would have prevented his making rather 

 startling mistakes. This was j)erha])s the result of his training and 



