VIBKISSEA. 487 



Vibrissea truncorum. Fries, Syst. Myc., ii. p. 31 ; 

 Phil., Brit. Disc., p. 316, pi. x. fig. 60; Sacc., Syll., viii. 

 n. 167 (figs. 32-35, p. 188). 



Ascophores gregarious or scattered, often in clusters of 

 24, stipitate, orbicular and rather fleshy, disc golden-yellow, 

 orange, tawny, or blood-red, convex, 3-5 mm. across, hypo- 

 thecium and excipulum hyaline, formed of intricately inter- 

 woven, septate hyphae about 3 p. thick, passing into pseudo- 

 pai'enchyma at the point where the widened apex of the stem 

 joins the excipulum, and running out on the free surface 

 into dark-coloured septate hyphae, which form more or less 

 of a fringe round the margin of the disc ; stem, 612 mm. 

 long, 1-5-3 mm. thick, round, composed of more or less 

 parallel, hyaline, septate hyphae, densely covered with dark- 

 coloured, obtuse, septate hyphae pointing at right angles to 

 the long axis of the stem ; asci elongated, narrowly cylindri- 

 cal, 8-spored ; spores hyaline, very slender, nearly as long as 

 the ascus, 200-220 x 1 5 /x, multiseptate, arranged in a pa- 

 rallel fascicle in the ascus ; paraphyses very slender, septate, 

 sometimes branched, tips slightly thickened and coloured. 



Leotia truncorum, Alb. & Schw., Consp., p. 397, t. 3, fig. 2. 



Vibrissea Margarita, White, Scot. Nat., vol. ii. p. 218; 

 Phil., Brit. Disc., p. 318 ; Sacc., Syll., viii. n. 170. 



On decaying wood and branches in streams ; most abundant 

 in subalpine districts. 



The head is about 2 lines broad, at first plane, becoming 

 convex, often slightly repand, urabilicate beneath ; the stem, 

 at first stuffed, becomes hollow, is 2-6 lines high, bluish- 

 grey, with blackish squamules, or smooth, darker towards 

 the base ; the asci are very long, cylindrical, numerous ; the 

 spores very slenderly filiform, divided by numerous septa, 

 narrower towards each extremity, 8 in the ascus ; paraphyses 

 numerous, branched ; septate, enlarged and brownish at the 

 summits. When removed from the water and exposed for a 

 short time to the air, the spores shoot out from the hyme- 

 nium with more or less violence, many of them remaining 

 attached by one extremity to the hymenium, waving to and 

 fro like floss silk, glittering in the light. (Phillips.) 



The blackish squamules mentioned by Phillips as occurring 

 on the stem, are due to the clustering together of a number 

 of the radiating hairs clothing its surface. 



