names about under other "generic" names, Hymenophallus and Dictyphora, 

 and the list of ""synonyms" is truly formidable, and not worth repeating here. 

 About a dozen figures of it have been published, many of them very good, but 

 some evidently reconstructed from the descriptions of travelers, and quite 

 amusing. 10 



A similar plant was first illustrated by Rumphius in the Herbarium Am- 

 boinense in 1750 under the name Phallus daemonum. 11 This figure is referred 

 to this species by Fischer, but to me does not appear to accord with the usual 

 plant so widely spread in the tropics. Next it was called Phallus indusiatus by 

 Ventenat (1798) from specimens sent by Pere Vaillant from Dutch Guiana. 

 Ventenat's figure is typical of the species, as I understand it ; hence, I use this 

 name. The next reference was by Desvaux, who saw Ventenat's picture, which 

 looked strange to him, and he made it a "new genus" and gave it an entirely 

 new name, Dictyophora phalloidea. He never saw a specimen in his life, and 

 if he was justified in basing a genus on a picture, he surely was not in changing 

 the specific name. Subsequent to Desvaux, there had been so much juggling 

 and naming that it is not worth while to go into details. 



PHALLOGASTER SACCATUS (Plate 120). It is a disputed 

 question whether Phallogaster saccatus is a phalloid or not. That is, 

 it is disputed by some who do not know the fresh plant. I do not 

 believe that any one who finds the plant will ever look for it anywhere 

 excepting among the phalloids. It has the same greenish, fetid gleba 

 that is associated with phalloids. the same spores and basidia, it 

 deliquesces in the same way, and it seems to me that its relationships 

 are entirely with the phalloids. It has no volva in the sense of ordi- 

 nary phalloids. but it appears to me that the peridium might be con- 

 sidered as analogous to the volva, the central tissue as analogous to 

 the receptacle, and thus the only difference from other phalloids would 

 be that the receptacle deliquesces. 12 



Phallogaster saccatus is a rare plant in the United States. 13 When 

 young it is pear shaped or club shaped, white with a smooth peridium. 

 and I thought when I first saw it that it was a young Xylaria. As 

 soon as I cut it open, however, its nature was evident, for I noted at 

 once the phalloid-like gleba. The center is white and somewhat 

 translucent tissue. In ripening this central tissue entirely deliquesces 

 and disappears, the gleba deliquesces and adheres to the inside of the 

 peridium as a fetid, mulcilaginous mass, and the peridium breaks 

 irregularly as shown in our figure ( Plate 120, Fig. 6), exposing the 

 adherent gleba. We are much pleased to present in our plates photo- 



10 Thus Gaudichaucl published a droH figure with the veil on the outside of the 

 pileus; Klotsch a curious affair with a large, bell-shaped veil attached to the 

 middle of the stem. 



11 It is a question if Rumphius 1 figure is not a different species as considered 

 by Berkeley. The pileus appears punctate rather than reticulate and the veil is 

 much more finely meshed than the usual form. I should not be surprised Jf 

 Rumphius' plant would yet be found to be quite distinct. I have a letter from my 

 friend, Professor McGinty, who states that after an exhaustive study of Fischer's 

 synonyms (with a date dictionary) he concludes that according to the "latest rules" 

 the species should be called (and he proposes the name) "Dictyophora daemon am 

 (Rumphius) McGinty." 



12 The plant has been placed with Hymenogasters. but a much simpler classi- 

 fication to my mind is based on the old definition which considers Hymenogasters 

 as underground Gastromycetes. mostly with permanent gleba cells. 



is I hunted the woods around Cincinnati, where it was originally discovered, 

 for many years before I found it. and I have never collected it but twice, once on 

 the ground by the side of an old log at Cincinnati, the other time on a log at 

 Eglon, W. Va. 



333 



