;o 
Mas see and Salmon. — Researches on 
rigid, dark brown, opaque, about 9 ^ wide towards the base, all 
regularly circinate at the apex ; asci oblong or oblong-pyriform, 
20-30 x 12-15 fx, octosporous, very evanescent; spores broadly 
elliptical, acute at both ends, about 10 x 7 /*, smooth, at first hyaline, 
becoming steel-grey. 
Rad. — On dung of Sinaitic Ibex ( Capra sinaitica), Kew, Feb. 1891 ; 
on Rabbit-dung, Reigate, Feb. 1891. (Distrib. — Germany; on rotten 
pine-wood, and on Camel-, Rabbit-, and Horse-dung). 
It is with some hesitation that we refer our Fungus to the species 
Magnusia nitida , Sacc., although there seems no doubt that the plant 
belongs to that genus. In Saccardo’s original description of the genus 
the appendages are described as springing from the base of the peri- 
thecium. In the full description of Magnusia nitida , however, given 
by Zopf and Sydow ( 1 . c.), the appendages are described as springing 
from the poles or blunt angles of the perithecium, and the statement 
is made that Saccardo’s description is erroneous. As regards the 
shape of the perithecium, this is evidently very variable. Saccardo, in 
Michelia ( 1 . c.), describes the perithecia as * e globoso horizontaliter 
oblonga/ and as ‘ applanato-oblonga ’ ; although in the key to the 
genera of the Perisporiaceae (Syll. i, p. 25) they are described simply 
as ‘ globosa/ Zopf and' Sydow speak of the perithecia as ‘ e globoso 
vel ovato horizontaliter producta, plus minus elongato-ellipsoidea vel 
obtuse triangularia ’ ; and add ‘ Die Exemplare auf Mist treten meist 
nur in der kurzellipsoi'd oder dreieckigen Form auf/ Schroeter ( 1 . c.) 
describes the perithecia as ‘kuglig, langlichrund oder stumpfeckig/ 
Our Fungus has nearly globose perithecia, with the appendages all 
springing from the apex. In other characters it agrees with the 
descriptions given of M. ?iitida. The ripe asci, in our plant, measure 
20-30x12-15, and the ripe spores iox^. Zopf and Sydow 
describe the asci as measuring 13-14 x 9-10 /u, and the spores 
5-6 x 3-4 p. It is, however, only after the perithecia have been 
kept growing for a long time that asci and spores are found fully 
mature and of the larger . size given above ; in the immature — and 
commoner— stages, our Fungus showed asci and spores, the latter 
faintly coloured and escaping in water from the asci through the 
deliquescence of the ascus-wall, of the size given by the above authors 
for S. nitida. 
Under the circumstances it seems better to consider our plant as 
a form of M. ?iitida than to describe it as a new species. It is distinct 
