NEW OR CRITICAL BRITI8H FUNGI. 
7 
Peniophora Crosslandi, Mass. 
Effused, thin, soft when moist, hymenium minutely setulose, 
pale grey, with a slight ochraceous tinge when dry ; margin deter- 
minate, slightly raised, the whole fungus separable from the matrix 
when dry ; cystidia numerous, the portion projecting above the 
hymenium conical, 30-40 X 10 /x, colourless and studded with 
particles of lime ; spores elliptical, 6 x 3 jx. 
On bark and wood of fir. 
Resembling P. gigantea in being soft and fleshy when growing, 
and cartilaginous and separable from the matrix when dry, but 
differing in the shorter cystidia and smaller spores. Patches 1-2 
in. across. Halifax. (C. Crossland). 
Russula azurea, Bresad. Fungi Trident . , t. 24 ; Cooke Hdbk. p. 328 ; 
Cooke Illustr. PI. 1088. 
Pileus 3-7 c.m. across, convex, then expanded, and more or less 
depressed, dry, pale glaucous-green, or rather dark olive-green, 
disc often darker, and frequently with a tinge of purple, covered 
everywhere at first with a dense, whitish bloom, margin very 
slightly striate ; cuticle separable ; flesh about 3 m.m. thick, be- 
coming thinner at the extreme margin, firm, white ; gills very 
narrow behind, and very slightly adnexed, broader in front, 3-5 
m.m. broad, crowded, brittle, often forked behind, with a few shorter 
ones that reach nearly to the base, connected by veins, pale cream 
colour from the first, not becoming darker ; basidia clavate, sterig- 
mata elongate, spores subglobose, minutely warted, colourless, 
about 9 x 8 p diameter ; cystidia absent ; stem 4-5 c.m. long, 
1-1*5 c.m. thick, nearly equal or slightly swollen at the base, very 
slightly longitudinally rugulose, solid but spongy inside, hence not 
firm when compressed. Taste quite mild ; smell none. 
On the ground under trees. 
Judging from the specimens received from various correspon- 
dents for identification, the present species is almost invariably 
confounded with Pussula cyanoxantha, Schaeff., from which the 
present species is at once distinguished by the dense mealy layer, 
resembling bloom, on the pileus, the smooth spores, and absence 
of projecting cystidia in the hymenium. In P. cyanoxantha the 
hymenium is glabrous, rather viscid, spores minutely warted, and 
large pointed cystidia projecting much above the level of the 
basidia are numerous. 
The characters furnished by the spores, whether rough or smooth, 
colourless or ochraceous, also the presence or absence of cystidia, 
projecting above the level of the hymenium, are characters of 
great importance in the discrimination of species of Russula — also 
others of the Agaricime, and should never be neglected. 
Dematium vinosum, Mass., n. sp. 
Forming broadly extended patches of a chocolate colour. Sterile 
hyphae creeping, colourless, septate, bearing here and there erect, 
branched, septate conidiophores ; conidia concatenate, terminal on 
