HORSE-HAIE BLIGHTS. 
57 
leaves on the ground. As far as has been ascertained the 
mycelium is not parasitic. 
A single strand of mycelium may be traced for several 
yards, united here and there to anything which comes in its 
way. But it has also the same habit as M. ohscuratus, of 
disappearing into the tissues of a dead branch and breaking 
out again some distance away, no rhizomorph being discover- 
able within the branch. The growing end of the rhizomorph 
tapers to a point which is not protected by any kind of cap. 
The mycelium, after running for some distance attached to 
various twigs, may become erect, if it is not so already, and 
produce the sporophore at its extremity, or the sporophore 
may be developed from dead twigs or on the bark of living 
trees at some distance from the rhizomorph. In the former 
case the connection of the sporophore with the mycelium is 
clear,' but in the latter it would not be suspected without a 
previous knowledge of the other mode of development. I 
have not met with specimens borne laterally on the mycelium. 
The pileus is hemispherical, broadly convex, or almost 
plane, about one centimetre in diameter. The centre is 
black or dark brown, depressed, usually with a minute conical 
papilla, clothed with coarse radially arranged fibrils which 
project in a fringe beyond the margin of the central area. 
Elsewhere the pileus is brownish-white, with radial ridges of 
coarse hairs which project over the margin. These ridges 
are frequently interrupted, so that pileus may appear some- 
v/hat concentrically zoned. 
The giUs are white, crowded, free, and slightly ventricose. 
The spores are white, narrow -oval, slightly inequilateral, 7-9 X 
4-5 
The stalk is 4-7 centimetres high, 0*25-0*5 mm. in dia- 
meter, black, dull, not homy, equal, thickly clothed with 
ad pressed white hairs. 
The hairs on the pileus are 3*5-4 diameter, smooth, 
simple, thick-walled, flexuose below, separate at the base, 
cohering above in pointed, tapering fascicles up to 0*5 mm. 
long. 
This species appears to be undescribed, and may receive 
the name of Marasmius coronatus, in allusion to the central 
6(6)15 (8) 
