This is the only Clathrus known to occur with certainty from New Zealand, where it is exceedingly common in certain seasons, being found in spring and autumn on the edges of forest clearings, or freshly-turned earth at roadsides or tracks cut through the forest. It occurs sparingly in Australia, but its distribution is not certainly known since the species has been confused by earlier workers with the following one [Clathrus gracilis]. Fischer recorded it from Chile, West Africa (1890, p. 53) and East Africa (1893, p.19). I believe, however, that the species is confined to this biologic region, and that Fischer has confused it with plants later named C. Preussii, C. chrysomycelinus or C. camerunensis.

The receptacle varies greatly in size (5-15 cm.) and in the number and arrangement of the arms. In many plants the arms are numerous, and form a close mesh, in which the polygonal interspaces are small; in others the arms may be few and the meshes large and angular. The arms may anastomose in such a regular manner that in plants detached from the volva it is not possible to determine the apex from the base; or in others the arms towards the base may he arranged in columnar fashion, or in rare cases produced to form a small basal tube-like stem. The surfaces of the arms may be smooth, finely transversely wrinkled, or exteriorly longitudinally grooved. In section they may be tubular or coarsely cellular, both conditions being not infrequent in the same plant.

The receptacle is not attached to the volva in any way, consequently it may be readily detached and carried by wind for some distance from its place of origin. The appearance of these latticed structures without visible means of attachment to the substratum was a potent source of mystification to the Maori. Forced to find some explanation of their (to him) mysterious appearance, and guided no doubt by their characteristic odour he came to the conclusion (according to Mr. Eladon Best) that they were tutae kehua or tutae whetu ("Faeces of ghosts or of the stars"). The specific name (cibarius = edible) was applied to the species under the impression that the unexpanded plant was used as an article of food by the Maori. But this is improbable as it is scarcely likely he would meddle with a plant obviously (to him) of supernatural origin. This view is supported by Mr. Best, who has advised me that the plant was not included among those fungi considered edible by the Maori.

This interesting plant may be best likened to an egg (the receptacle) held in an egg cup (the volva). The volva is of the typical Phalloid type, with an outer furfuraceous and an inner thick and gelatinous layer; but differs in that the third layer is wanting, the gelatinous layer ending abruptly in a smooth surface. The receptacle is egg-shaped, hollow, of the usual chambered pseudoparenchyma, and apparently indehiscent. The gleba is produced within a single layer of lenticular cells, attached to the inner wall of the receptacle. It differs from that of the typical Phalloids in being practically non-mucilaginous and inodorous. The spores, too, are much larger than is usual in this order, and are provided with a short persistent pedicel. One additional interesting feature is that in the immature plant a thin strand of primordial tissue connects the base of the peridium with the inner tissue of the receptacle through a narrow pore at the base of the latter.

The absence of peridial plates in the gelatinous layer of the peridium shows that the affinities of this plant are more with the Phallaceae than the Clathraceae; but the development of the gleba interiorly to the tissue of the receptacle shows relationships with the Clathraceae.