MYCOLOGICAL NOTES. 



BY C. G. LLOYD. 



No. 24. 



CINCINNATI, O. DECEMBER, 19O6, 



CONCERNING THE PHALLOIDS. 



During a recent visit we made to Kew we spent a number of weeks 

 in a study of the literature of the phalloids, and of the specimens to be 

 found at Kew and the British Museum, and we have also studied those 

 at Paris. We expect in future to devote considerable space in Mycolog- 

 ical Notes to the phalloids. At the present time it is largely a picture 

 study, and excepting from Europe and portions of the United States, 

 the subject is scantily known. Professor Ed. Fischer, of Berne, 

 Switzerland, has made a specialty of the phalloids for a number of 

 years, and with the aid of his work we feel that we accomplished more 

 at Kew 1 in six weeks' study than we could have clone in six months had 

 we found the literature in as chaotic a condition as we found the puff 

 ball literature. 2 Most of the phalloids of foreign countries that are 

 known have been described from dried specimens and the pictures that 

 represent them reconstructed, and we think there are some pictures that 

 do not well represent the plants. Many Australian and Ceylonese speci- 

 mens were described by Berkeley in his early days, at that period of his 

 life when he was doing good and careful work, and most of his phalloid 

 work was well done. Very fine work has been done in recent years on 

 the phalloids of Java by Penzig and on the phalloids of Brazil by Ed. 

 Moeller. 



The main difficulty in studying foreign phalloids is the scanty 

 land imperfect material on which much of the past work has been 

 [based. It was largely done with dried specimens, some of them now 

 'from sixty to eighty years old. Phalloids are largely characterized 

 by their shape, and dried phalloids are for that reason infinitely better 

 jto work with than dried agarics, all of which have very much the same 



or similar shapes. But color is also an important character of phal- 



oids, and dried specimens soon lose their color. 



1 In my opinion, there is no other institution in the world where one can study the litera- 

 ure and material of any botanical subject so conveniently as at Kew. Practically everything 

 n the way of literature of phalloids I found there, and the chief advantage is the convenience 

 vith which the books may be consulted. 



2 Prof Fischer has done good work on phalloids, and the only criticism we would offer is 

 hat he fills his papers too full of personal authorities for names. In many respects, it re- 

 "inds us of the society notes in the Sunday newspapers. 



293 



UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 



AT LOS ANGELES 



