LICHENS AND FUNGI OF OTAGO, NEW ZEALAND. 409 



may have at command, for investigation, ample series of living specimens, in all 

 their forms or conditions of growth, will prove the plants in question— what I 

 here presume them to be — in reality new species. 



I. LIC HENES.— (Plate XXIX.) 

 1. Abrothallus Gurreyi, nov. sp. (figs. 1 to 5.) 



Parasitic on the thallus of Parmelia perforata, Ach., (which is copiously cevered 

 with apothecia and spermogones) : on the trunks and branches of dead trees,* 

 Greenisland Bush. 



In characters, this species is intermediate between A. Smithii, Tul., and A. 

 oxysporus, Tul.f These species, when they occur (as they most frequently do) 

 on the thallus of Parmelia saxatilis, Ach., are almost invariably found occupying 

 special growths from, or anamorphoses of, its thallus. But A. Curreyi occurs 

 directly on the ordinary thallus of P. perforata (fig. 1, a b), towards its periphery, 

 in the position usually occupied by the spermogones of the Parmelia (c). In 

 this respect it resembles other species of Abrothallus, which are parasitic on the 

 thallus of other species of Parmelia, and on species of Platysma and Stictina. 



The apothecia of A. Curreyi are less prominent and tuberculiform, and smaller 

 than those of A. Smithii ; more convex and protuberant than the discoid, flattened, 

 sub-immersed ones of A. oxysporus. In A. Curreyi, the apothecia are typically 

 minute, black, convex, and immarginate; partly immersed in the thallus, in whose 

 superficial tissues they have been originally developed (figs. 1 b, 2 a). They vary, 

 however, considerably in form and size, having a tendency on the one hand to be- 

 come tuberculiform, and on the other, discoid. In the young and old states they 

 are apt to be confounded with the spermogones of P. perforata, which are generally 

 more or less abundant on adjoining lobes of the thallus. In the young state, the 

 apothecia of A. Curreyi appear as very minute papillae; in the old, when the tuber- 

 culiform hymenium has fallen away, it frequently leaves a black, stellate-fissured 

 scar, resembling that characteristic of old emptied spermogones of the Parmelia. 

 I have elsewhere \ described the characters of these spermogones of the Parmelia, 

 which are easily distinguishable from the apothecia of the Abrothallus on micro- 

 scopical examination, though sometimes not otherwise. In my Otago specimens 

 of P. perforata, I find its spermogones (figs. 1 c, 3) though generally sub-marginal, 

 punctiform, and immersed, occasionally occupying also central positions on the 



* Especially " Goai" (Sophora tetraptera, Aiton). P. perforata is equally abundant some- 

 times also on living trees in Saddlehill Bush, and other remnants of the piimitive forest. 



f " Monograph of the genus Abrothallus „•" with two coloured plates. — Quart. Journal of 

 Microscopical Science. January 1 857. 



I " Memoir on the Spermogones and Pycnides of the Higher Lichens." — Trans. Royal Society 

 Edinburgh, vol. xxii. p. 211 (Plate II. figs. 4, 5). 



