ON THE PILOBOLIDJE. 
305 
epispore from those of P. cedipus, and, moreover, the fungus 
agreed in all respects but its minuteness with the true Kleinii, 
into which it gradually passed on the following days. The 
inequality of the spores in the same sporangium, together 
with the dwarfed size, is a guide to the true cause of this 
abnormal appearance : it points out that the fungus has not 
yet established itself and is of weak and uncertain growth. 
Klein also, as has already been mentioned, believed that 
he had succeeded in tracing the transformation of Pilobolus 
into two species of Mucor, and therefore declares his belief 
in that pleomorphism which various authors have rashly 
attributed to other species of Mucorini. 
In 1871 Cooke published the “ Handbook of British 
Fungi,” in which he records 1 two species as inhabitants of 
Britain, P. crystallinus and P. roridus. It is impossible from 
the description of the former to tell what species is intended ; 
the description of the second species agrees with that of 
P. roridus , but not with the figure, which is taken from 
Currey’s plate, in the Journal of the Linmean Society, 
already mentioned, and represents, as I have said, P. Kleinii. 
Moreover the note “ smaller and slenderer than P. crystallinus ” 
is only partially true ; P. roridus is indeed more delicate, but 
at the same time taller than P. crystallinus, being usually of 
double height. The same is true if by P. crystallinus is meant 
either Kleinii or cedipus. There is also a curious error in the 
generic description of the sporange, which is stated to 
contain “ a globose sporidium.” 
Brefeld, in 1872, mentions 2 and figures a species which 
he assigns to the genus Pilobolus, under the name of P. 
Mucedo, but which afterwards 3 (1881) he recognises to be the 
same as that previously called by Cesati, P. anomalies. In the 
latter place he also gives a short account of the various species 
of Pilobolus, but, although he describes the species sometimes 
with great exactitude, yet he is pursued by so strange a fate 
that not one of the names which he assigns to them is rightly 
given. His excellent figures, however, enable us to remedy 
his mistakes. A small table is appended, giving, in the first 
column, the name assigned by Brefeld ; in the second, the 
true name: 
P. crystallinus. P. Kleinii, Van Tiegliem. 
P. cedipus. P. Kleinii, forma, sphcerospora, milii. 
P. microsporus. P. crystallinus, Tode. 
P. roridus. P. lonyipes, Van Tiegliem. 
1 Page 633, fig. 301. 
2 Botanische Uutersuch. i., 27, pi. 1, figs. 25—6. 
3 L.c., iv., 66. 
