424 CONNECTICUT EXPERIMENT STATION REPORT, 1912. 



species rather than linear, like those of E. radicalis, already 

 discussed. 



Both Schweinitz and Fries always considered Sphaeria gyrosa 

 and S. radicalis as distinct species, but of very similar appear- 

 ance, and Fries, when he formed the genus Endothia, did not 

 include the latter under it. Botanists in their day, however, did 

 not make very careful microscopic examinations. De Notaris, 

 in Sfer. Ital. i 1 , p. 91, in 1863, seems to have been the first 

 to place 5. radicalis under the genus Endothia, and Tulasne, in 

 Sel. Fung. Carp. 2, p. 87 and p. 298, the same year, was 

 apparently the first to consider the S. gyrosa and S. radicalis as 

 one species, which he called Melogramma gyrosa. Fuckel also, 

 in 1869, treated them as one species, and since that time European 

 botanists have generally considered them as a single species, 

 using sometimes E. gyrosa and sometimes E. radicalis as a 

 specific name. In view of the information already given in 

 Shear's letter, we are inclined to believe that this interpretation 

 is correct, and that 5". gyrosa is merely the conidial stage, as 

 first suggested by Winter in Rab. Krypt. Fl. i 2 , p. 804. 



A considerable number of names have been applied in Europe 

 to Endothia gyrosa, but it is rather difficult to determine whether 

 all of these apply to the fungus under discussion. For instance, 

 Streinz, in Nom. Fung., p. 545, in 1862, under ,S. gyrosa, gives 

 5\ fluens Sow. as a synonym, and under S. radicalis, p. 559, 

 gives S. tuberculariae Rud. as another. Shear has examined the 

 Sowerby specimen, and he says: "There is little doubt that 

 Sphaeria fluens Sow., described and figured by Sowerby in the 

 supplement of his English Fungi, 1814, Plate 420, published 

 as part of Plate 438, from a collection by Charles Lyall, in the 

 New Forest of southern England, is the pycnidial condition of 

 Endothia radicalis De Not." If this is true, then it must be an 

 extremely rare fungus in England, since in answer to a letter 

 to the Kew herbarium we received the reply that " Endothia 

 gyrosa is very rare in Britain, if it really occurs." From 

 Sowerby's description, one cannot be sure if it relates to this 

 or some other fungus. Mr. Wakefield of Kew writes concern- 

 ing our inquiry as to the host: "It is not possible to say with 

 certainty what is the host of Sowerby's Sphaeria fluens. The 

 specimen is very small, and no note is attached to it." We do 

 not believe that this English specimen has as yet been definitely 



