46 



Mycologia 



lection and study of these minute but interesting plants and the 

 recent collection of two apparently undescribed species has 

 prompted the writing of the present paper. For the following 

 reasons both the collection and study of the plants of this genus 

 is difficult and unsatisfactory. 



1. The plants are often so small that they are easily overlooked 

 and for this reason seldom collected. 



2. The descriptions of the known species are so fragmentary 

 that in many cases they do not render the plants recognizable. 



3. The type specimens preserved in the ordinary way are of 

 little value since the plants, at best small, become much smaller 

 on drying and are often lost with the crumbling earth on which 

 they usually grow. 



These difficulties are partly compensated by the fact that while 

 the plants are very small the spores, as a rule, are unusually large. 

 In addition to their large size they are often sculptured, the 

 nature of the sculpturing furnishing valuable diagnostic char- 

 acters. The type species of the genus has the spores covered 

 with delicate, shallow reticulations. Other species have the 

 spores marked with deep reticulations, sharp spines, minutely ver- 

 rucose or coarsely tuberculate. In a number of species the spores 

 are smooth and we must in such cases rely upon other diagnostic 

 characters. In addition to the preservation of plants on the sub- 

 stratum for the study of gross characters in the ordinary way 

 microscopic slides should be preserved, especially in those forms 

 in which the spores furnish diagnostic characters. With careful 

 drawings and descriptions from fresh material and specimens 

 preserved in the above manner the species of the genus should be 

 made recognizable. 



The plants of this genus show rather close relationship with 

 some of the Ascobolaceae both in the character of the spores and 

 asci as well as in the protrusion of the asci above the surface of 

 the hymenium, the latter character being the one on which the 

 Ascobolaceae are distinguished from the Pezizaceae. To the 

 writer it seems very doubtful if there is any morphological charac- 

 ter by which these two families can be separated. The most 

 natural classification of the true cup-fungi (Pezizales) to my 



