84 HARPER: TWO REMARKABLE DISCOMYCETES 
relatively few paraphyses. They measure 10-12 X 200~-300un. 
They are linear for most of their length, rounded-truncate at the 
apex and narrowed near the base. The base is enlarged and irreg- 
ular. The paraphyses are about 2u in diameter, slightly enlarged 
at the upper end, rarely branched and with few septa. The spores 
are oblong with rounded ends, smooth, usually with two oil drops 
when mature, 5-8 X I0-I4up. 
Rehm placed the plant in the genus Pustularia and compared 
it with Pustularia vesiculosa, noting that it differed from that 
species in the larger size and smaller spores. According to Rehm’s 
key Pustularia contains species of fleshy Pezizaceae, which have 
smooth and entire cups, asci turning blue with iodine, elliptical 
spores and sessile apothecia. It includes species like Peziza 
vesiculosa, P. Stevensoniana, and P. coronaria. Boudier disregards 
the surface of the apothecia and places species like Peziza coronaria 
and Sepultaria sepulta in a genus Sarcosphaera, on the ground that 
they are semi-subterranean with the apothecia closed at first and 
bursting irregularly at maturity. Pustularia gigantea is semi-sub- 
terranean in its habit and bursts irregularly at maturity and might 
be placed in this genus, but it has a definite mouth the walls of . 
which have simply become infolded during growth. 
' The natural arrangement of the species of Pezizaceae has not 
yet been discovered. All that was said about the groups of the 
Helvellaceae above applies equally to the groups of the large cup 
fungi. As Dodge has emphasized, a knowledge of the early stages 
is a necessary prerequisite of a natural classification. 
It is not certain to which group Pustularia gigantea belongs. 
It is not close to Pustularia vesiculosa, as Rehm suggests, for in 
addition to the difference in the size of the spores the subterranean 
habit and character of the mouth are very different from that 
species. Our collections of Pustularia-vesiculosa have mouths of 
the ordinary form and grow in the mulching about trees and on 
manure heaps. They agree with Lloyd’s photograph in Hard’s 
Mushroom, f. 432 (1908). Pustularia gigantea appears to be closer 
to Peziza coronaria, for that species is subterranean. Boudier’s illus- 
tration, pl. 302, resembles our expanded plant. Cooke's illustra- 
tion in Mycographia, f. 238, agrees in size and method of opening, 
and the same is true of Kalchbrenner’s illustration of Peziza coro- 
