218 Transactions of the Royal Society of South Africa. 
The Sneezewood trees are particularly favourable to this method of infec- 
tion ; the branches are brittle and easily broken off, and the tree is slow- 
growing- and relatively poor in sapwood, conditions favourable to the entrance 
of the fungus. 
Mr. J. D. Keet, District Forest Officer, who has had this fungus under 
observation for some time, in reply to a question re the distribution of this 
fungus, states : " It is worse in forests more heavily stocked with Sneeze- 
wood and such forests — in the Eastern Conservancy — belong entirely to the 
' Low Type Forests.' In the ' High Forests,' Sneezewood occurs mostly 
on the stony, drier ridges, ])ut while the individual trees are much bigger 
they are few and far between. In such forests Sneezewood is very seldom 
attacked by Fomes rimosus, although, strange to say. Black Ironwood (Olea 
laurifolia) may here be attacked." I have examined the fungus from Black 
Ironwood and verified Mr. Keet's statement that it is Fomes rimosus. 
The elevation of the Gxulu forest where this fungus is particularly abun- 
dant on Sneezewood varies from 3300-3600 ft. The fungus, as mentioned above, 
causes the heartwood of the tree to rot, and as a result the tree, though it 
remains standing and growing, is hollowed in the centre. This hollowing is 
easily evident by tapping the tree. The rotten wood usually crumbles into 
a dark brown powder, and natives make holes in diseased trees to get at 
this mixture of rotten wood and fungus, which they use for tinder and know 
as " viti." The fruiting bodies or sporophores of the fungus are often found 
high up on the branches, and as noted always in association with a wound 
or scars of former branches. The natives know the sporophores under the 
name " Sbeni " (liver). The sporophores are hoof-shaped, with a black 
cracked surface (hence the second name of the fungus). 
A transverse cut (Fig. 3) through a diseased trunk in its earlier stages 
shows a number of yellowish-brown pockets usually surrounded by a Vandyke 
brown margin. These pockets are arranged more or less concentrically and 
extend outwards in radial lines. 
In a tangential section these pockets stand out as lens-shaped masses. 
The yellowish-brown mass, which represents nothing less than a felt-like 
mass of fungus threads, can be readily lifted out of the pocket. Fig. 4 
shows some empty pockets from which the fungus has dropped. 
By the spread of the fungus, both longitudinally through the wood 
elements and transversely through the medullary rays and pits, the rotten 
wood is gradually added to until ultimately only the sapwood and the bast 
exterior to it remain. It is seldom that the fungus attacks the sapwood, and 
if it does the death of the tree is certain. 
Not always is the stem merely hollowed out as above described, but the 
fungus also forms masses of felted tissue in the decayed area. Fig. 5 
represents a mass of felt-like fungous threads matted together and taken 
from a hollow Sneezewood tree. This particular mass was almost white. 
