121 



plication of genera. " Cesati and De Notaris," says Winter, " distinguisK 

 the genus sordaria from rossellini chiefly by the nature of it? peritheci\mi, 

 which is said to be crassiuscula in sordaria, and suberustacea vel lignes< ertia 

 in rossellinia ; but these writers incluile a number of species in sordaria whose 

 perithecia are clearlj' woody in texture, or even of a carbonaceous nature (1). 

 while Auerswald brings together a number of things under sordaria which 

 have nothing in common with it e.\cept the form and colour «f the sjxiridia ; 

 some of these belong to rossellinia, others to anthostoma, others again to 

 amphisphcBiia, and lastly some to arnium Nitschke. Fiickel, on the other 

 hand, limits 1 is genus sordaria to the single species S. coprophila, bringing 

 the other nearly allied forms under other genera whose species inhabit dung, 

 or, in one case, the lees of wine; he grounds his genera on the pesence or 

 absence of a stroma, on the apj endages of the 8:>oridia, the ba'ryness of the 

 perithecia, and on the mode of germination of the sporidia. In the first suj)- 

 plement to his Beitriige, Fiickel nevertheless describes a true sordaiia growing 

 on wood, while it is hinted that the genera cercophora and malinvernia cannot 

 be retained ; lastly in his second supplement, Fiickel abandons these genera. 

 Tiniting them with sordaria." Winter promises to show that Fiikel's malin- 

 vernia breviseta is identical with cercophora conica Fiickel, or is at most only 

 a varity of that species. Winter says he has traced the growth of the sporidia 

 in malivemia breviseta, sordaria coprophila, and cercophora fimiseda, and can 

 confirm Fiickel'a later views, viz., that these three species must be reunited 

 into one, and that De Bary indirectly corroborates this opinion as he has 

 named a certain species cerophora fimiseda, which he (Winter) finds on ex- 

 amination to coincide with cerophora conica in every respect. Again, from a 

 careful study of specimens, Winter asserts that cercophora mirabilis Fiickel 

 and sordaria corprophUa ces and De Not are quite identical, and that the first 

 must therefore be brought under sordaria coprophila as a synonjTii. In a like 

 way Winter reduces his own sordaria setosa to a form of S. coprophila, and 

 further reduces the new genera coprolepa and hyiwcopra to sordaria ; these 

 two genera were separated by Fiickel on account of the presence of a stroma 

 in the former, but the term "stroma" Winter says requires a more accurate 

 definition than it has had yet. In some species of diaporthe Nitschke a 

 stroma is mentioned, of which not even a black boundary line is perceptible. 

 Now this ©an scarcely be what is usually implied by that term. In fact, the 

 division of sphoerice into " simplices" and " compositoe " cannot be strictly 

 interpreted, and that certain genera combine both characters ; what becomes 

 then of the genera coprolepa and hypocopra if the presence of a stroma is the 

 only or main difference between them? Winter would reduce the two to 

 sordaria ; in hypocopra the sporidia are clothed with a gelatinous envelope, 

 but are without appendages ; in sordaria the reverse is the case, and he argues 

 that the envelojpe and the appendages are physiologically equivalent and 



(1) Clommentario della Societa crittogamica Italica, 1863, p. 225. 



