912 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVI. No. 939 



dothia gyrosa on wood in the southern part of 

 this country. The true blight fungus also 

 produces this modification on the wood of cut 

 stumps in the north as does E. radicalis in the 

 south. So far as the writer has seen, the 

 asco-stage never develops later in these simple 

 Cytospora fruiting pustules of Endothiella. 



While some American botanists are ready 

 enough to admit the identity of Endothia 

 gyrosa of Europe, they question its relation- 

 ship to Bphwria gyrosa of Schweinitz, upon 

 whose specimens from North Carolina the 

 species was originally founded. This doubt 

 is brought about partly by the fact that, as in 

 the case of Sphwria radicalis Schw., there are 

 to-day no specimens of Sphceria gyrosa col- 

 lected by Schweinitz that show the asco-stage, 

 and this stage is necessary to properly identify 

 any of these species. The writer thinks he 

 has sufficient reasons, without the ascospores, 

 to identify Sphmria gyrosa Schw. as the recog- 

 nized Endothia gyrosa of Europe to-day. 

 These are as follows : 



1. While we have not looked for Endothia 

 gyrosa at Salem, N. C. (the type locality of 

 Sphmria gyrosa), we have no doubt that speci- 

 mens of it can be found there to-day, since we 

 collected it at points both north and south of 

 that region. 



2. Schweinitz gave the hosts as decaying 

 bark of knots, also living bark of Fagus and 

 Juglans. So far as the writer knows, neither 

 Endothia gyrosa in Europe or this or a similar 

 fungus in America has been found on either 

 of these hosts. He has made a careful search 

 on beech, butternut and walnut both north 

 and south, during the past two years, without 

 finding any suspicious fungus that he could 

 connect with Schweinitz's 8. gyrosa. Earlow 

 has called attention to the question of error 

 on the part of Schweinitz in determining 

 hosts, as follows: 



Too much weight, however, should not be placed 

 on the hosts given by Schweinitz, for an exam- 

 ination of fungi of different kinds collected by 

 him shows that in his statements as to the hosts 

 he was not always to be trusted. 



This would be especially true of fungi col- 

 lected on the exposed roots of trees, a common 



habitat of this fungus. Even if Schweinitz 

 made no error in the determination of the 

 hosts, we know that certain American botan- 

 ists, as Marshall, about the time of Schwein- 

 itz's publication of his " Syn. Fung. Car." 

 used the generic name Fagus to include the 

 chestnut as well as the beech, and perhaps 

 Schweinitz may have used it in this sense! 



3. Both Schweinitz and Fries, to whom 

 Schweinitz sent specimens, recognized Sphceria 

 gyrosa and 8. radicalis as distinct species, but 

 with a very similar aspect. Both made de- 

 scriptions of each of these species, and Fries 

 placed them in separate sections of the genus 

 Sphceria. Doubt as to identity would seem to 

 be entirely removed by Fries's later note on 

 8. gyrosa, in " Elench. Fung.," p. 84, where 

 he states : 



With new examples sent by Schweinitz, others 

 sent from western France by Guepin, and perhaps 

 also those from Levieux, agree in every way. 

 These tubercles break forth regularly from the 

 bark of Quercus racemosa, but on barked wood 

 the same thing is present simple in all respects, 

 crowded, subconfluent, punctiform, without a dis- 

 tinct stroma. . . . 



The latter is a very good description of the 

 Endothiella stage already referred to. 



4. The only specimen of Sphceria gyrosa in 

 the mounted Schweinitz collection at the 

 Philadelphia Academy of Science is No. 1431, 

 which is evidently not the type, but a speci- 

 men received years after the original descrip- 

 tion, sent by Torrey from New England. This 

 has already been shown by Farlow, Shear and 

 the Andersons to be something else, a Nectria, 

 and its identification as Sphceria gyrosa seems 

 to be an error on Schweinitz's part, since he 

 apparently had lost his type specimen when 

 he received this. However, Farlow has a 

 specimen in the Curtis Herbarium at Har- 

 vard, of which he vn-ites me: 



The Sehweinitzian specimen of S. gyrosa in 

 Herb. Curtis at the present time shows no asci or 

 spores, but there is a sketch with the specimen 

 made by Curtis, from which it may be inferred 

 that he saw spores, and that they were like those 

 of Diaporthe parasitica. 



