40 THE CHICAGO ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 



liy. E, fufescens, Ach. Thallus rufescent, squamose, lobes rotun- 

 date, incised, complicate. Ach. L. U. 304. (1810). 

 On earth in Will County. Not easily distinguished from E. 



hepaticum, but is darker and thinner, and the spores are 



smaller. 



FAMILY 12. VERRUCARIEI. 



Sub-family Pyrenulei. 



In the following genera we approach the limits marking the 

 close relations of the lower lichens with the fungi. The 

 absence or slight indications of a thallus have caused 

 Lichenologists to doubt whether certain species of Ver- 

 rucaria and Pyrenula, should be classed under these 

 names, or as Sphaerias. The effort has been made to elimi- 

 nate the myco lichens, all corticolous, from the true ones. 

 Fries expressed this idea,* and that a distinction be made 

 between the saxicoline and corticoline groups, which, seeming 

 a natural arrangement, I have followed. Tuckerman con- 

 ceived the sub family as naturally divided into two great 

 classes: "the one," to quote his own language, " (confined 

 to inorganic substrates) of true lichens, with a well marked 

 thallus, and the other (confined to organic substrates) of 

 plants, the thallus of which is more or less obsolete, and the 

 affinity close to Pyrenomycetous Fungi." But even with a 

 fair array of evidence in support of this arrangement, 

 Nylander dissents from this view."]" 



Sagedia, (Mass.) K'br. Tuckerman. Thallus crustaceous; apothe- 

 cia innate-superficial. Koerber. Syst. 362. Nyl. Pyrenoc. 36, 

 classed under Verrucaria. Tuck. Gen. Lich. 263. 



114. S- oxyspora, Tuckerm. Thallus thin, effuse; apothecia black, 

 ellipsoid, conoid; perithecium black. V. albissima, Nyl. 

 Scand. 

 Occurs on Betula papyracea along the lake shore nearGlencoe. 



The few native birch will soon disappear and with them this 



species. 



f 



*Sy.st. Orbis Vigot. 264. » 



tNyl. Pyrenoc. 



