1G ALGJE AMERICJE BOREALIS EXSICCATAS. 
170. Caulerpa crassifolia, Ag. 
var. Mexicana , Ag. 
171. Yalonia utricularis, Ag. 
172. Anadyomene flabellata, Lam. x. 
173. Monostroma orbiculatum, Thuret. 
174. Monostroma crepidinum, Farlow. 
175. Chaetomorpha Linum, Kiitz. 
176. Lyngbya aestuarii, Liebm. 
var. ferruginea , Kiitz. 
177. Oscillaria princeps, Vauch. 
178. Spirulina tenuissima, Kiitz. 
179. Poly cystis pallida, Thuret. 
180. Gloeocapsa crepidinum, Thuret. 
NOTES ON THE DISCOMYCETES. 
By Dr. Geo. Winter.* 
( Translated by W. Phillips, F.L.S.) 
Being at the present time engaged in the investigation and 
critical observation of the Discomycetes for my Fungus Flora, I 
collect a number of notes, which, as they would claim too much 
space in my work itself, I will publish here. I unite with this 
preliminary publication, as I did with the first on the Uridines , a 
request to Mycologists to convey to me any casual difference of 
opinion, in order that precision and reliability may be thereby given 
to my work. Living specimens of Discomycetes are also much 
desired. 
I. — While in the Ustilagos and Uridines no special difficulties 
existed, in the majority of cases, in recognising the species of older 
authors, in the Ascomycetes and particularly in the larger Dis- 
comycetes, there is much more difficulty, nay, in many cases an im- 
possibility, of forming a safe opinion as to what the older Mycolo- 
gists meant by their species. This unsatisfactory state of things is 
attributable to different facts. 
In the next place it is a sufficiently well-known circumstance 
that the older authors had not sufficient regard to the internal 
structure (asci, sporidia and paraphyses) and did not make use of 
it for distinguishing species. That this is of the greatest impor- 
tance in the Discomycetes is now generally recognised. 
Again, the difficulty of recognising the older species is often 
increased through the very imperfect description and figuring, as it 
also is by the fact that many authors have described a smaller 
specimen as a new species. Truly does Fries say (“ Syst. Myco.,” 
* a 
Hedwigia,” May, 1881, p. 69. 
