40 Transactions British MycologicaJ Society. 



in the "Bulletin de la Societe Mycologique de France" 

 are doubtless the beginning of a more thorough revision 

 of this large order of Fungi. We are all looking forward 

 to Monsieur Maire's promised monograph of the genus 

 Russula, the general lines of which he laid down some time 

 ago. The completion of such work is reserved, we hope, 

 for better and happier days. 



Patouillard published his " Hymenom3-cetes d' Europe " 

 in 1887 and his " Essai Taxonomique " in 1900, but neither 

 of these contains any description of species. As far as I 

 know he has not published any monographs of the kind 

 which mycologists are pining for. I picture Patouillard 

 as snowbound in a vast accumulation of mycological notes 

 from which he cannot escape. He amuses himself by throw- 

 ing out a few notes on foreign or extra-European species, 

 which are published bv various journals, but which nobody 

 reads. The perfect systematic work on European 

 Hvmenomycetes which might have been written by him is 

 left for some future worker to produce. 



Turning from France to Germany, Dr. J. Schroeter 

 published the first volume of "Die Pilze Schlesiens" in 1889. 

 This first volume contains the Hymenomycetes. It is so very 

 rarely mentioned by British mycologists when dealing with 

 Agarics, that it is only just to call attention to it as the 

 beginning of what could be done on a larger scale. 

 Unfortunately it contains comparatively such a small 

 number of species of the larger fungi, that it cannot be 

 considered as much more than a general sketch of a new 

 classification with numerous detailed examples. It is there- 

 fore of very little practical value for general use to-day. 

 Many of the commonest species are missing, and such a 

 large genus as Russula only contains S3 species, divided 

 between white spored and yellow spored, the latter being 

 placed in a separate genus — Russulina. Schroeter was 

 evidently as bewildered as we are when faced with the 

 necessity of giving systematic coherence to the Russulae. 

 Many other genera are equally sketchy, and his specific 

 names are maddening, but on the other hand we have good 

 macroscopic and microscopic description of many species, 

 doubtless of those he had examined himself, and he gives 

 very careful and, as I have found, reliable measurements of 

 the spores and cystidia, although I doubt whether measure- 

 ments of cystidia are of any use — it is important to know 

 if they exist and what their shape is, or if thev project 

 beyond the basidia. Schroeter made a feature of the 

 cystidia or sterile projecting cells on the gill edge. 



