982 FUNGI. 
European genera, with many species at present peculiar to itsel” 
Tropical forms extend upwards into the Southern States. 
The islands of the West Indies have been more or less ex- 
amined, but none so thoroughly as Cuba, at first by Ramon de la 
Sagra, and afterwards by Wright.* The three principal genera 
of Hymenomycetes represented are Agaricus, Marasmius, and 
Polyporus, represented severally by 82, 51, and 120 species, 
amounting to more than half the entire number. Of the 490 
species, about 57 per cent. are peculiar to the island; 13 per 
cent. are widely dispersed species; 12 per cent. are common te 
the island and Central America, together with the warmer parts 
of South America and Mexico; 3 per cent. are common to it 
with the United States, especially the Southern ; while 13 per 
cent. are European species, including, however, 13 which may 
be considered as cosmopolitan. Some common tropical species 
do not occur, and, on the whole, the general character seems 
sub-tropical rather than tropical. Many of the species are 
decidedly those of temperate regions, or at least nearly allied. 
Perhaps the most interesting species are those which occur in 
the genera Craterellus and Laschia, the latter genus, especially, 
yielding several new forms. The fact that the climate is, on the 
whole, more temperate than that of some other islands in the 
same latitudes, would lead us to expect the presence of a com- 
paratively large number of European species, or those which 
are found in the more northern United States, or British North 
America, and may account for the fact that so small a propor- 
tion of species should be identical with those from neighbouring 
islands. 
In Central America only a few small collections have been 
made, which indicate a sub-tropical region. 
From the northern parts of South America, M. Leprieur 
collected in French Guiana.t Southwards of this, Spruce col- 
lected in the countries bordering on the River Amazon, and 
* Berkeley and Curtis, ‘‘ Fungi Cubensis,” in ‘‘Journ. Linn. Soc.” (1868); 
Ramon de la Sagra, ‘‘ Hist. Phys. de l’Isle de Cuba, Cryptogames, par Montagne” 
(1841); Montagne, in ‘* Ann. des Sci. Nat.” February, 1842. 
‘+ Montagne, ‘‘ Cryptogamia Guyanensis,” ‘‘ Ann. Sci. Nat.” 4™° gér. iii. 
