THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 161 



Through the courtesy of Mr. J. G. Luehmann, F.L.S., I am able 

 to show you this unique specimen from the National Heriiarium. 



The other is a Cseoma, and it is interesting as being one of 

 the only two recorded for Australia. Cseoma-forms are just 

 ..^cidia without the cups or pseudo-peridia, and represent one of 

 the stages of the development of rust-fungi. 



It has been experimentally proved that a number of these 

 Cseoma-forms represent a stage in the life-history of the 

 Melampsorese, but none of this genus has been found as yet on 

 Lobelia. From their general appearance and close resemblance 

 to ^cidia it is not surprising that these Caeoma-forms are 

 mistaken for them, and ^cidium lobelice, Thuem., now turns out 

 to be a Cseoma. 



The Sphseropsides are a group of imperfect fungi, so called 

 because they are assumed to be the imperfect stage of a higher 

 group in which the spores are not only contained in a capsule or 

 perithecium, as in this instance, but are also enclosed in a bag or 

 ascus inside the perithecium. Although the connection between 

 the so-called lower and higher forms has been proved in a few 

 cases, yet in the great majority it has not been traced. 



On our Lobelias there are six genera in this group, representing 

 as many species, and they have either colourless or coloured 

 spores, which are either continuous or divided by transverse 

 partitions or septa. 



The Hyphomycetes or Moulds are represented by two species. 

 The one, Fusarium gracile, is ruddy in the mass, while the 

 slender, graceful conidia are colourless. The other is a black 

 fungus, and the most common of all on Lobelia gibbosa, yet it is 

 so peculiar in its structure that I had to place it in a new genus, 

 named Septotrichum from the dark-brown setje or hairs which 

 cover it being septate. 



There still remains to be described a hard, black, irregular 

 body, known as a Sclerotium. On some of the whitened stems 

 found by Mr. French at Carrum there were black bodies, either 

 naked or covered, round or irregular in shape, and varying in 

 size from ^ mm. to 2 or 3 mm. in length. As the stems decay 

 these bodies are set free and lie on the ground until growth 

 commences again, and then they produce the reproductive stage 

 of the fungus. When cut across ihey are seen to be composed of 

 innumerable fungus-filaments, closely compacted, whitish in the 

 interior, but dark toward the outer surface. These Sclerotia or 

 hard bodies represent a resting stage of the fungus in which the 

 mycelial threads are twisted round each other like a ball of 

 worsted and rendered compact. They are usually of a dark 

 colour on the outside and more or less white within, and vary in 

 size from very small shot to that of a child's head. 



Formerly this was reckoned a genus by itself, but it is now 



