1897 | NOTES ON THE GENUS CALOSTOMA 181 
d2velopment of any member of the genus is that given by Fischer 
in 1884, in which the morphology and development of C. cinna- 
‘darinum are fully and correctly described. The material, how- 
ever, on which this account was based does not seem to have 
been in condition to show the development of the gleba, except 
to a limited extent. The only remaining contribution of impor- 
tance which relates to the morphology of the genus is that con- 
tained in the monograph published by Massee in 1888, where 
the development of Calostoma cinnabarinum, based upon speci- 
mens in the Kew Herbarium, is described in some detail. To 
this description we shall have occasion to refer presently. 
At maturity C. cinnabarinum, which is the most common 
American species and may serve as a type for the whole genus, 
‘presents the appearance of an ochraceous globose body opening 
above by a stellate mouth guarded by toothlike valves, and 
extending below into a footstalk composed of anastomosing 
strands. The gleba lies at the center of the globose body, and 
is surrounded in its younger stages by four layers: (1) the volva, 
an outer gelatinous layer which soon disapppears; (2) the 
exoperidium, a layer just within the volva, also breaking away 
at an early stage; (3) the endoperidium, which is the external 
layer in older specimens; and (4) the spore sac containing the 
gleba. 
Before passing to the development of the gleba, the other 
elements of the plant may be described briefly, further details 
concerning which may be sought in the accounts of either Fischer 
or Massee already referred to. 
The volva, which envelops the fungus in its early stages, is 
composed of a homogeneous gelatinous mass arising from the 
' gelatinification of the walls of a layer of hyphz which are found 
imbedded in it and are developed in a radial direction from the 
exoperidium which lies next to it. When swollen by water, as 
it usually isin a state of nature, it constitutes a viscid jelly-like 
: el ‘Mass es soon becomes ruptured at the apex, partly through 
: 
ao and partly by the protrusion of the inner 
. clements up through it. At this = it is oa ane from the 
a 
