BOTANICAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH. 559 



wall. Similar rhizoids occur in G. furcata, but only 

 sparingly, while in G. ccqnilaris tliey are entirely absent. 

 Consequently the hollowing out of the cylindrical or 

 slightly flattened thallus is generally very well marked in 

 G. furcata, while, on the other hand, it is more indistinct 

 in G. capillaris and E. ccrvicornis. Hence the distinction 

 between these various species is only a question of grada- 

 tion, and therefore no ground for a generic separation of 

 of Gloiopeltis and Undotrichia is to be found in the anato- 

 mical structure of the thallus. 



On account of this similarity as regards the thallus, the 

 difference in the "' cystocarps " appeared to me the more 

 striking. 



In Endotrichia ccrvicornis were found, as correctly 

 described and figured by Suringar,^ numerous small cysto- 

 carps immersed in the upper part of the copiously branched 

 thallus. The reuiform fruit nucleus is embedded in the 

 interior of the thallus, and only induces a very slight local 

 protuberance on the wall. Within this fruit nucleus can 

 be distinguished a small sterile " placenta " with irregularly 

 branched cells. Its whole mass when ripe breaks down 

 into spores, which escape to the exterior through a simple 

 aperture in the wall of the thallus. In comparison with 

 this fruiting specimens of G. furcata showed, as Suringar 

 has figured,^ a marked mamillation due to small but 

 strongly projecting fruit protuberances. Sections through 

 these " cystocarps " showed that in this case roundish 

 masses of closely compressed spores were embedded in the 

 wall of the thallus which at that point projected outwards 

 in a marked degree. Moreover, those fruit nuclei were 

 always penetrated in the most varied manner by thin 

 isolated strands of sterile branched filaments. Their 

 surface was often undulated, but above all a distinct 

 " placenta " was always absent, its place at the lower end 

 of the " fruit nucleus " being taken by a bunch of quite 

 short rhizoids which projected towards the interior of the 

 thallus. 



To me, however, the most striking feature of those 

 fruiting examples of G. furcata was that those specimens 



1 Alg. Japou. t. 21. 



- Alg. Japon., t. 19. illustr. plate 20, fig. 2-3. 



