(276 ) 
ditiers except that the spores—agreeing in their dimensions with the 
larger ones just cited—are in twos; suggesting a comparison with Verr. 
geminella, Nv. (Pyrenoc. p. 40) from Mexico. Paraphyses well exhibited 
in most of these plants, but notalways (as compare Koerb. Parerg. p. 336, 
with Massalongo and Nylander) and the habit of the species, owing to the 
colour of the thalline film, and the mostly small apothecia, seems a little 
alien to that of the present cluster. An Alabama lichen (Mr. Beaumont) 
is however before me (not well separable from Meissner’s specimens of 
P. Cinchone, Fée, which is referred by Nylander to P. nitida) combining 
the exact habit of P. lactea, with the spores (only smaller) of P. nitida. 
LXIX.—PYRENASTRUM, Eschw 
Eschw. Syst. p. 16; Lich. Bras. p. 142, pr. p. Fr. 8. 0. V. p. 265. Mey. 
Entwick. p. 330. Spreng. Syst. Veg. 4,1, p. 248, pr. p. Mont. Aperc. 
Morph. p. 11; Crypt. Guy., p. 52; Syll. p. 370. Tuckerm. Suppl. 1, 
l. c. p. 429. Parmentaria, Fée Ess. p. 70, t.20,f.1; Suppl. p. 67, t. 41, 
f.1,2. Mass. Ric. p. 144. Verrucarie spp., Nv}. Prrenoc. p. 144; in 
Prodr. Fl. N. Gran. p. 115. 
Apothecia emerso-denudata turbinata, pluribus sepius in ostiolum 
commune pallidum desinentibus, perithecio conico-elongato obliquo 
atro, amphithecio nigricante, paraphysibus capillaribus. Spore ex 
ellipsoideo oblonge, muriformi-multiloculares, fuscescentes. Sper- 
matia haud visa. Thallus hypophlceodes. 
The essential difference (as compare Eschweiler Lich. Bras. 1. ¢.) of 
the type before us, which is distinguished from the analogous Astrothelium, 
in the immediately preceding sub-family, by the absence of a stroma, 
should seem to lie in the elongation of the more or less oblique, flask- 
shaped perithecia, quite as much as in the convergence and final conflu- 
ence of these into a compound apothecium. The compound state may 
not indeed be reached; but the other features are enough to distinguish 
our species from all Pyrenila pachycheila. The pale ostioles of Pyren- 
astrum, traceable into the inner layer of the apothecium, and now more 
or less confluent above into a kind of disk, offer another interesting 
feature; recurring however in the second species of the not dissimilar 
Parathelium, Nyl., as this is described (Prodr. Fl. N. Gran. p. 126) though 
it seems to be wanting in the first. 
The whole character of the fructification of Pyrenastrum appears to 
approach closely to that of a type of Pyrenomycetous Fungi (Spherie 
incus@, Fr. Syst. Myc. 2, p. 335, dein Valsa., S. V. S. p. 410) with which 
it is compared by Fries. 
Except in so far as it reaches the low country of our southern states, 
the group is tropical. Fée’s indication of the since generally accepted 
and best-known species (P. astroideum) was followed by Eschweiler’s 
