228 



Mycologia 



Type species, Capnodium maximum Berk. & Curt. 



Stromata, black or dark-brown, formed within the living 

 leaves of the host, later erumpent, bearing pycnidia and peri- 

 thecia ; peritheciuni black, coriaceous, very long-stalked, the 

 ascigerous portion clavate, tapering into a long, beak-like neck 

 traversed by a canal ; apex at first closed but at maturity fim- 

 briate-lacerate, a definite opening finally resulting; proliferation 

 of the perithecium taking place after the escape of the asco- 

 spores, the stalk of a second perithecium arising as a continua- 

 tion of the/ beak-like neck of the first and emerging from the 

 opening at the tip of the beak ; the second perithecium long- 

 stalked and in every way identical with the first ; by the repeti- 

 tion of this phenomenon as many as five perithecia formed in 

 linear series ; two perithecia occasionally arising from one open- 

 ing, a definite fork thus being formed ; asci ovate, very long- 

 stalked, thin-walled, evanescent, 8-spored, ' aparaphysate ; asco- 

 spores spherical to sub-ellipsoidal, thin-walled, brown, unicellu- 

 lar ; pycnidia borne on the stroma among the perithecia, sessile 

 or short-stipitate, globose, black ; pycnospores hyaline, fusiform, 

 unicellular. 



Resembling Caliciopsis in asci, ascospores, pycnidia, and pycno- 

 spores, and differing from that genus essentially only in the 

 possession of the phenomenon of proliferation. The method of 

 dehiscence of the perithecium is identical with that found in 

 Caliciopsis, Tripospora tripos, and Corynelia fructicola. 



The subgenus Capnodiella of the genus Capnodium Mon- 

 tagne was erected by Saccardo (45) to include the single species 

 Capnodium maximum Berk. & Curt., which differs from other 

 members of the genus . in having unicellular ascospores. Later 

 the subgenus, still containing the single species, was raised by 

 him (Saccardo 45) to generic rank. Meanwhile Giesenhagen 

 (15) studied material of the same fungus, and failing to recog- 

 nize it as Capnodium maximum, founded the genus Sorica upon 

 it. He named the species S. Dusenii but later (16) having 

 learned of his error, changed the name to 6\ maxima (Berk. & 

 Curt.) Giesenhagen. The genus Sorica is placed by him in the 

 Sphaeriaceae-Phaeosporeae of Saccardo, though he regards it as 

 of doubtful relationships. He suggests the possibility of includ- 

 ing it in the Xylariaceae or in the Ceratostomataceae. Von 



