118 ENDOSPOREAE [DIACHAEA 



KEY TO THE SPECIES OF DIACHAEA. 



A. Sporangia globose : — 



a. Lime in stalk white. 



Spores with dark raised bands and tubercles. 



3. D. splendens 



Spores spinulose. 2. D. bulbillosa 



Spores delicately reticulated. 4. D. subsessilis 



b. Lime in stalk orange. 5. D. Thomasii 



B. Sporangia cylindrical (globose in D. leucopoda var. globosa). 



Spores nearly smooth ; lime in stalk white. 



1. D. leucopoda 



Spores delicately reticulated ; lime absent in the 

 two recorded gatherings. 6. D. cylindrica 



Spores warted ; lime absent. 7. D. caespitosa 



1. D. leucopoda Rost. Mon., p. 190, fig. 178 (1875). 

 Plasmodium opaque white. Sporangia gregarious, cylindrical, 

 obtuse, stalked, 0*7 mm. high by 0*25 mm. broad, iridescent 

 purple ; sporangium- wall membranous, hyaline. Stalk 

 white, stout, brittle, furrowed, one-third or one-half the 

 height of the sporangium, broad at the base, rising from a well 

 developed hypothallus, densely charged with round lime- 

 granules 2 to 4 /x diam. Columella cylindrical or narrowed 

 upwards, reaching half-way or nearly to the apex of the sporan- 

 gium, white, densely charged with lime in the form of granules, 

 sometimes in the form of crystalline nodules. CapiUitium 

 consisting of profusely branched and anastomosing threads 

 connecting the columella with the sporangium- wall, dark 

 violet-brown, colourless at the extremities. Spores dull violet, 

 minutely spinulose, 7 to 9 ft diam. — Mass. Mon., 259 ; 

 Macbr. N. Am. Slime-Moulds, 134. Trichia leucopodia Bull. 

 Champ., p. 121, t. 502, fig. 2 (1791). Stemonitis elegans 

 Trentep. in Roth Catal. Bot., i. 220 (1797). 8. leucostyla 

 Pers. Syn., 186 (1801). S. leucopodia DC. Fl. Fr., ii. 257 

 (1805). Diachaea elegans Fr. Syst. Orb. Veg., i. 143 (1825) ; 

 Lister Mycetozoa, 91. D. confusa Mass. Mon., 259 (1892). 



Var. globosa Lister : sporangia globose. 



V\. 99. — a. sporangia (England) ; b. capillitium and spores ; c. spore. 

 This abundant and widely distributed species often forms large 

 Plasmodia that produce many hundred sporangia. The type of D. con- 

 fusa Mass. from Jamaica is a form of D. leucopoda ; the spores measure 

 7 to 8/i, and are not "clustered" but free, except where they are 



