246 MYCOLOGY 



mouth when young is covered with a yellowish tomentose membrane, 

 the peridiola are more numerous than in the preceding genus, and each is 

 attached to the peridium by an elastic cord which springs from a pro- 

 jection on the peridiolum. The plants are smaller than in the genus 

 Cyathus. 



Crucibulum vvlgare 



Peridium yellowish-brown, becoming paler with age, outer surface when young 

 velvety tomentose, inner surface smooth and shining; mouth at first closed by a yel- 

 iowish membrane, which ruptures and exposes the peridiola. Peridiola biconcave, 

 with a projection on one side from which originates the elastic cord which attaches 

 the peridiola to the peridium. 



Plant about one-fourth inch in height and about the same in diameter. 



Family 5. Sclerodermace^. — The fruit bodies of the fungi in- 

 cluded in this family are subterranean, or epigeic, globose, sessile, or 

 occasionally with a root-like stalk. The peridium is generally simple, 

 thick, rough, warty, or scaly, opening irregularly at maturity. The 

 gleba consists of rounded basidia-bearing parts, which are separated by 

 sterile veins or strands of hyphae. The individual basidia are pear- 

 shaped to club-shaped with spores which are often lateral in position. 

 The capillitium is rudimentary. Scleroderma is the most common genus 

 with sessile fruit bodies and thick, hard, leathery peridium, frequently 

 warty. It usually bursts at the apex into stellate lobes. Scleroderma 

 geaster grows in sandy woods, banks or along roadsides. S. vulgare 

 is common in dry situations, or hard ground, along cinder paths and 

 gravel walks. 



Family 6. Sph^robolacEjE. — The fruit body is on the surface of 

 the ground. The periphery of the gleba is furnished with a palisade- 

 like layer of radially arranged turgescent cells. The basidia-bearing 

 portion of the gleba is penetrated by sterile veins, or hyphal strands. 

 When ripe the gelatinous gleba is forcibly ejected from the fruit body by 

 the inversion of the palisade-like layer. The family includes a single 

 genus, Spharobolus, of five species. The best-known species is 5. car- 

 poholus of cosmopolitan distribution. 



C. Phallom\cetes. — The carrion fungi, stink-horn fungi, or dead- 

 men's fingers, resembles the button stage of the Amanitas, and the puff- 

 balls when still young, but later the outer wall is ruptured and the stem 

 elongates carrying upward the sporogenous tissue as a terminal cap, or 

 enlargement. The subterranean mycelium is cord-like and from it the 



