Fetch . — The Genus Endocalyx , Berkeley and Broome. 393 
at the slightest touch, and, therefore, the usual gathering consists of irregu- 
larly broken columns surrounded by masses of black spores mixed with 
irregular yellow scales. The latter have exactly the same structure as the 
scales which are found covering the newly opened ‘ fair weather ’ form : the 
yellow conical mound in the latter case consists of fragments of the tissue 
which should have grown out as the wall of the column. Berkeley and 
Broome’s specimen of Melanconium melanoxan thum consists chiefly of 
fragments of these columns. 
The suggestion that we may be dealing with two species is easily met. 
The spores, sporiferous hyphae, yellow hyphae, and structure of the base 
are identical in the two forms, and, in addition, the columnar form can be 
grown from the ‘ fair weather ’ form. If a piece of palm frond bearing the 
latter is placed in a Petrie dish with just sufficient water to cover the bottom, 
the yellow columns grow out from the pustules in two or three days. It is 
evident from this that the hyphae are capable of continuous growth ; and in 
this respect the fungus differs from most of the Melanconiaceae, in which 
the spores are distributed almost as soon as the pustule opens and are not 
succeeded by a fresh crop from the same conidiophores. 
Another variation occurs in very wet weather, or can be induced by 
keeping the substratum too moist. I obtained it first by saturating with 
water a piece of palm frond bearing unopened pustules from which it was 
hoped to grow perfect examples. When the pustules burst there grew out 
from each a circular tuft of white hyphae to a diameter of about two milli- 
metres. Apparently there had been a mistake in the identification of the 
pustules, or they had been attacked by some mould. However, vertical 
sections showed that the hyphae were not parasitic, but were continuous 
down to the base of the pustule : they were the same diameter as the 
normal hyphae of Endocalyx , and irregular yellow granules, sometimes 
adhering to a hypha and sometimes free, were mixed with them. After a 
few days, when the cultivation had become drier, the usual yellow column 
was produced in the centre of each white tuft. In this case the columns 
appeared at first sight to be attached to the substratum by a fibrillose 
disk. 
The yellow colouring matter is soluble in absolute alcohol, chloroform, 
or ether, and to some extent in ammonia since the latter separates the 
individual hyphae of the yellow wall. It appears to form a continuous 
layer over the external hyphae and bind them together, but when the latter 
grow very rapidly (as in the instance cited above) it is left in irregular 
lumps, and the hyphae are white (in mass) and free from each other. The 
colour varies from bright yellow to greenish yellow. 
The spores of E. melanoxanthus on Cocos nucifera measure 14-19 x 
12-14 /x and are 6-7 /x thick: those of E. melanoxanthus on Oncospenna 
fascicidatmn appear to be uniformly smaller, and measure 10-17 x 8-13 /x. 
