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VARIOLARI4 aspergilla.
Sprinkled Variolaria.
3 3
CRYPTOGAM1A Algce.
Gen. Char. Receptacles cup-shaped, with a torn
border from the crust, powdery, with a fertile
disk beneath.
Spec. Char. Crust orbicular, tartareous, thickish,
du ll white, wrinkled, with a smooth white polished
edge. Receptacles scattered, elevated, hemispherical,
w ith an obsolete border. Powder
very white.
Syn. V a rio la ria aspergilla. jLch. JWcth. 13, Turn,
and Borr. Lich. Brit. v. 1. 67.
Lichen aspergillus. Ach. Prodr. 2 8 ; ex c lu d in g
the reference to Persoon.
T h is , received from Mr. W . Borrer, who finds it in Sussex,
more commonly on rails than on trees, agrees less precisely
than could be wished with a named specimen from Prof. Acha-
rius, which is whiter, and answers to the description in his
Methodus, of the crust being scarce manifestly rimose ; whereas
ours is wrinkled, and when dry evidently full of cracks. Mr,
Turner and Mr. Borrer nevertheless have decided it, by their
specimens from that author, to be right. We are not without
doubts of his having confounded different plants.
The edo-e of the present is thin, polished, of an uniform
white ; the rest greyish or blueish white, a little thickened and
tartareous, wrinkled and cracked. Receptacles neither numerous
nor crowded, but scattered, convex and prominent;
their border minute and soon obliterated; their internal disk
pale flesh-coloured, concealed by the copious white powder,
which forms a dense mass, and when rubbed turns greenish.
The colour of this species is unchanged by moisture. Its taste
is not bitter as in V.faginea, 1.1713.