TRANSACTIONS OP THE SECTIONS. 159 



sandy mould scratched up by rabbits. The largest specimen was 12 inches in 

 height, and its pileiform volva 2J- inches across the top ; the whole was covered 

 with brown dust-like spores. The pileiform volva was on the exterior covered 

 with raised reticulations with pieces of the exterior volva adhering to it ; and on 

 the inner side next the stem it was smooth and of a paler colour, somewha"t 

 whitish. 



The stem was rough and fibrous, of a woody nature, and slightly attenuated 

 upwai'ds ; it was buried 3 or 4 inches in the soil. At its base were the remains 

 or the lower part of the volva. All the plants were quite dry and covered very 

 thickly with the brown spores. 



The largest specimen is in- the possession of Mr. Worthington G. Smith, who, 

 appreciating the rarity of the plant, has had it mounted under a glass, in the same 

 manner as a picture. The next best is deposited in the Museum at Kew, where it 

 receives the full benefit of the sun, which has, as might be expected, taken nearly 

 all the colour out of it. The Rev. M. J. Berkeley has the third specimen, and the 

 one exhibited has since been given to Mr. C. E. Broome for his herbarium. This 

 latter specimen was growing on the outside of the tree, out of which, through a 

 hole in the base, some of the soil had been scratched. It had not grown as well 

 as the others, which were straight, well-grown specimens, but was much twisted 

 and deformed. Every year since the finder has examined the spot, with the hope 

 of meeting with more specimens, but with as yet no result ; and last year the old 

 tree was cut down, being dead, so that the chance of obtaining more is considerably 

 lessened. 



He has tried, as yet with no success, to raise the fungus artificially, by planting 

 some of the spores in a pot covered with a bell-glass and kept darlc in a warm 

 moist atmosphere, the soil consisting of a mixture of debris from an old ash mixed 

 with silver sand. An account of one of the specimens found, with figures, micro- 

 scopical structure, &c., was written by Mr. Worthington G. Smith in the ' Gardeners' 

 Chronicle ' of August 16, 1873 ; and a very good colom-ed drawing of it is to be seen 

 amongst Mr. W. G. Smith's collection of fungi di'awings in the British Museum ; 

 also in Sowerby's ' English Fungi,' t. 390, there is a drawing of the specimen. 



The following is the description in Smith's English Flora : — " Whole plant more 

 or less of a brown hue. Exterior volva ovate, fleshy, dirty white, inclining to 

 brown ; buried 6-8 inches in the sand, with a few dirty-white floccose hairs at the 

 base; middle volva much thinner and almost membranaceous, connected with the 

 outer by mucilage, smooth within ; inner volva internally villous, covered with 

 very abundant yellow-brown dust-like seed ; externally concave and smooth. Stem 

 formed within the cavity of the interior volva, cylindric, straight, short, fleshy, 

 filled with mucilage, but afterwards elongated upwards with wonderful force and 

 quickness, and protruded through the soil, can-ying with it almost the whole inner 

 volva, adnate with its apex, and covered with a portion of the outer coat torn ofi"- 

 in the same manner. Immediately after maturity it becomes dry, as also the 

 volva; tubular within, and externally fibrous, and remains a long time bleached 

 and tossed about by wind and rain." 



The following is a list of the authors by whom the plant is mentioned : — 



Batarrea phalloides, P. — Fr. S. M. iii. p. 7; Woodw. Phil. Trans, vol. Lxxiv. p. 423, 



626 ; Ann. N. H. no. 303 ; Smith, Spic. i. 1. 12 ; Sow. t. 390 ; Pers. Syn. t. 3. f. 1 : 

 ees, f. 257 ; Eng. Flor. v. p. 298 ; Hook. Journ. 1843, t. 22. f. 1 ; Bisch. f. 3463 ; 

 Corda, Anl. t. E. f 50, no. 4r-6 ; Cooke, Br. Fungi, p. 367, f. Ill ; Smith, W. G., 

 in ' Gardeners' Chronicle,' Aug. 16, 1873. 



On some Fossil Seeds from tJie Lower Carboniferous Beds of Lancashire. 

 By Prof, W. C. Williamson, F.R.S. 



M. Adolphe Brongniart has recently described a number of fossil seeds obtained 

 by M. Cyril Grand Eury from the silicified Carboniferous deposits of St. Etienne, 

 in France. Some of these exhibited a remarkable cavity at the apex of each ortho- 

 tropous seed, enclosed within the testa and separating the latter structure from the 

 nucleus. This cavity appeared to M. Brongniart to have received into its interior 



