920 RECOKD OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



distiDguished by au ellipsoidal perithecium, minute spores, about 

 6 fjL in diameter, and a tuft of elegant hairs. 



Proposed New Genus of Fungi— Peniophora. * — Dr. Cooke pro- 

 poses to separate sixteen species of the two Friesian genera of 

 Corticium and Stereum (of tne order Auricularini of Hymenomycetous 

 Fungi), and to unite them in a new genus under the name of 

 Penio])hora {tttji'lov, a shuttle). He puints out that Fries paid little 

 or no attention to microscopic characters, so that his whole classifica- 

 tion of the Ilymenomycetes was limited to what could be detected by 

 a common lens. In these days of microscopic research such a limit 

 is scarcely satisfactory, and in the above t^vo genera there are struc- 

 tural features which indicate that Fries' arrangement was not so 

 perfect as it might have been had he brought the Microscope to his aid. 



The new genus includes those species in which the hymenium 

 is beset with short, rigid, uncoloured, rough, projecting cells 

 (" metuloids ") which are attenuated upwards or subfusiform and 

 give the surface a velvety appearance, the old genera retaining only 

 the sjjecies in which these shuttle-shaped bodies are absent, the 

 hymenium being naked. 



Vine Fungi.j — The various fungi which attack the vine, either as 

 parasites or as saprophytes, have been carefully studied, enumerated, 

 and described by von Thiimen, and classified according to the part of 

 the plant on which they are found. On the grapes he describes only 

 a single species, Macrosporium uvarmn (new) ; on the woody parts no 

 fewer than twenty -four species, a large number of them new, belonging 

 to the genera Fiisarium, Biplodia, Leptotliyrmm, and others. Para- 

 sitic on the leaves are six species, all described as new ; while on the 

 root is a single species, Boesleria liypogcm, new not only specifically, 

 but also generically, belonging to the Helvellacese. 



Propagation of Cluster-cups. :j:— Dr. Cooke, in his 'Introduction 

 to the Study of Microscopic Fungi,' calls attention to the difficulty of 

 accounting for the appearance of the cluster-cuj)s (^JEcidiacei) bursting 

 through the cuticle of the leaves of the plants on which they are 

 found. The question is as to the manner in which their spores reach 

 the interior of the leaf where they germinate. It certainly cannot be 

 by way of the stomata, for these are too small, nor would this account 

 for the preservation of the spores until the succeeding year. Equally 

 difficult is it to imagine a process by which they can gain access to 

 the interior of the growing leaf through the roots, nor have they been 

 traced passing through the tissues of the plants. Dr. Cooke mentions 

 the fact, however, that the Kev. M. J. Berkeley was able to propagate 

 cluster-cups by growing plants from seeds which had been placed in 

 contact with their spores. 



Following this hint, and noting the fact that certain species 

 ripen and discharge their spores at the time when the plants on 



* 'Grevillert,' viii. (1879) p. 17. 



t F. von Thiimen, ' Die Tilze des Wciustockcs,' Vicuna, 1878 ; bee ' Hedwigia,' 

 xvii. (1879), p. lis. 



X ' Am. Naturalist,' xiii. (1879) i>. 1(17 



