186 Journal of the Mitchell Society [February 



Blackish when fresh, with white margin when dry, brownish 



above with a gray-tlrab hymenium T. cuticularis (8) - 



Dull cinnamon or chestnut, margin paler when growing, 



soft and spongy T. albido-brunnca (9) 



Yellowish, hard when dry T. lutosa (10) 



Plants incrusting and ascending small plants or twigs from the 



ground T. fimbriata (11) 



1. Thelephora palmata (Scop.) Fr. 



This species, which is sharply marked by its upright branched 

 habit, dark color and very foetid odor, has not yet been found in 

 Chapel Hill, and in the following description of the fresh plant I 

 have made use of notes by Miss M. McKenney, of Olympia, Wash- 

 ington. The species is northern in its range and descends to our 

 state only in the mountains, so far as known with certainty. Cm-tis 

 reports it as common in woods in this state, but he may have had 

 some other plant in mind. 



Gregarious or tufted, 3-6 cm. high, 2.5-4 cm. broad, trunk thin, 

 flattened, black. Branches numerous, flattened, black; these branch 

 again into slender branchlets which are round, flexible, tough, simple 

 or occasionally flattened, divided, narrowing at the tip, which is 

 white or gray. Odor most disagreeable, something like decayed 

 cabbage combined with iodoform. Spores (of a plant from Olym- 

 pia, Wash.) blackish brown, irregularly warted or spiny, 7.4-9.3 x 

 8-11. l[x. 



In the dried state the plants are deep brown on the surface, the 

 central flesh remaining black. They are rather brittle with nearly 

 as much the appearance of a Clavaria as of a Thelephora, entirely 

 smooth with a surface of velvet-like appearance all over. Odor 

 retained, taste similar, bad, a good deal like that of Hijgrophorus 

 Peckii. Burt gives the color of fresh plants as fuscous purple. The 

 plant is found under conifers or in grassy fields. 



Asheville. Beardslee. 



Common on earth in woods. Curtis. 



2. Thelephora multipartita (Schw.) Fr.* 



Plates 24 and 35 

 Plants about 2.5-3.5 cm. high, and 1.5-2.5 cm. broad above, 

 distinctly stalked and dividing above into rather narrow, flattened 



* Thelephora anthoccphala (Bull.) Fr. is reported from North Carolina by Biirt (from 

 Beardslee) and by Curtis. We have not found a plajit that we can separate from T. multi- 

 partita as this, and as we cannot work out any difference from descriptions that will make 

 a clear distinction between the two species we refrain from copying a description (see Burt, 

 . c, p., 203). 



