h hi
and ScHWElNiz, in their admirable Conspectus Fungoruin,
seem to have given rise to this confusion, which has been farther
increased by D e C a n d o l l e in the Flore Française,
under E . purpureum, although that author has, in the same
work, very correctly described it under the name of Betulæ.
P e r s o o n , in his new Mycologia Europæa, a work of great
merit, but very deficient in synonymes and microscopical investigation,
has again united the two under E . hetulinum, although,
in a subsequent observation, be says that it grows
chiefly on the superior surface, particularly if it is of a red colour.
To clear up the matter, he has not given us a single reference,
except the general one of E . hetulinum, roseum, and
purpureum of authors.
In the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal, I have observed,
that E . Betulæ is almost invariably found of a deep purple
colom’, and very irregular in form, sometimes nearly covering
the leaf, at others merely scattered over it. The colour becomes
dingy in age, but does not entirely lose its character.
Viewed with a pocket-magnifier, it appears not filamentous,
but finely granulated.
Erineum hetulinum, on the contrary, is more defined, and
chiefly on, though not confined to, the lower surface. The colour
changes from white to a ferruginous or dark tobacco colour.
The tubes have some resemblance in their form, but are
smaller, and more excentric. The whole plant, also, is never
so confluent as the other, and is generally more or less sunk in
a swollen portion of the leaf.
Fig. 1. Erineum Betulæ. Fig. 2. The same, somewhat magnified,
tubes or sporidia, highly magnified.
Fig. 3. The