BREFELDIA.] 
AMAUROCniETACE;E. 
135 
SPECIES NOT MET WITH IN THE QUOTED COLLECTIONS. 
2. A. minor Sacc. & Ellis, in Michelia, ii., p. 566. Effused, 
varying, oblong, adnate-applanato, the margin almost naked, 
externally clay-colour, very minutely punctate, internally blaclash. 
Capillitium threads filiform, sparingly branched and anastomosing, 
very pale brown. Spores blacldsh, minutely warted, then quite 
smooth, 15 fjL diam. 
Hah. On twigs.— Utah. 
This description suggests an imperfect specimen of Dictydicethalium 
2ilumheum. 
Genus 21.— BREFELDIA Eostafinski, Versuch, p. 8 (1873). 
^thalia pulvinate, consisting of subcylindrical, somewhat branched 
and continent sporangia, rising from a base of spongy barren 
tissue, which is continued, chiefly among the lower portions of 
the sporangia, in irregular folds, sometimes forming imperfect 
sporangium-walls and central columellse. Capillitium of numerous 
horizontal threads, uniting at the surface of the sporangium to 
form many -chambered vesicles. 
1. B. maxima Eost., Yersuch, p. 8 (1873). Plasmodium white, 
in rotten stumps of fir, beech, etc. ^thalia 2 to 16 cm. broad, 
5 to 10 mm. thick, purplish-brown, composed of elongated 
branching sporangia 0*3 to 0*5 mm. diam., extending upwards 
from the spongy basal tissue, which is continued among them 
as irregularly branching, puiple-brown membranous folds, usually 
forming distinct rigid columellte. Capillitium consisting of 
numerous threads radiating from near the central part of the 
sporangium ; each thread expands at the boundary of the 
sporangium into a many-chambered vesicle, which is continued 
into a corresponding radial thread of the adjoining sporangium. 
The proximal ends of the threads are slightly attached in clusters 
of three or four by a fragile membrane. The vesicles are of firm 
structure, often containing a spore in several of the chambers, 
with no appearance of forming pai't of the sporangium-wall, 
except where they occasionally coalesce in fewer or greater numbers 
to form vertical scalariform strands. Spores purplish-brown, 
minutely spinulose, 9 to 12 /x diam. — Mon., p. 213; Cooke, Myx. 
Brit., p. 53 ; Mass., Mon., p. 91 ; Macbride, in Bull. Nat. Hist. 
Iowa, ii., p. 389. Reticularia maxima Fr., Syst. Orb. Veg., i., 
p. 147 (1825). Licea perre2?tans Berk., in Gard. Chron. (1848), 
p. 451. 
Plate LT., A.—c. subdiagramtnatic view of portions of four columnar 
sporangia from an iBthalium ; each sporangium has a central columella, 
and is clothed on the surface with numerous vesicles, from which short 
capillitium threads pass into the adjacent sporangia ; at x is seen a 
scalariform strand, formed by vertical union of a row of vesicles, x 50; 
d. capillitium threads and vesicles, x 180 ; e. spore, x GOO (England). 
