BURIED WOOD. Auckland, Moturoa Island, Bay of Islands, 10 m; Titirangi, Waitakere Ranges, 250 m; Glen Esk Valley, Piha, 280 m; Piha Valley, 250 m; Kumeu Hills, 120 m; Swanson, 130 m; Laingholm, 60 m. South Australia, Mt. Lofty; National Park, Hindmarsh Valley, Kuitpo. New South Wales, Terrigal, Barrington Tops, Bullahdelah, Mt. Irvine. Victoria, Aramt, Craigie. Tasmania, Mt. Wellington.

Hymenophore annual, coriaceous, gregarious or caespitose, seldom solitary. Pilei infundibuliform, or split on one side to the stem apex, sometimes flabelliform, often rosetted, with stems discrete but apices concrescent, 15-35 mm tall, 12-30 mm wide; pileus surface glabrous, bay or tobacco-brown, concolorous or with darker lateral zones, radiately plicate; hymenial surface grey when fertile, when sterile ochre or pallid brown, irregularly fluted, creviced longitudinally when old; margin thinning out, concolorous, crenate, often deeply lobed or incised, somewhat translucent. Stems 5-10 mm long, 1-4 mm wide, sometimes fused but usually single although several may arise from a common mycelial base, finely velutinate, concolorous. Context wood colour, 0.3-0.5 mm thick, of radiately arranged parallel compact hyphae; skeletal hyphae 3.5-4 µm diameter, lumena capillary; generative hyphae 3.5-4 µm diameter, walls 0.2 µm thick, with clamp connections. Gloeocystidia arising in the base of the subhymenium and traversing the hymenium, not projecting, flexuous-cylindrical or subventricose, to 90 x 8 µm. Hymenial layer to 80 µm deep, a dense palisade of basidia, paraphyses, and gloeocystidia. Basidia subclavate, 25-40 x 5-6 µm, bearing 2-4 spores; sterigmata slender, erect, to 6 µm long. Paraphyses subclavate or subcylindrical, 16-28 x 4-5 µm. Spores broadly elliptical or oval, apiculate, 5-6 x 3-3.5 µm, walls smooth, hyaline, 0.2 µm thick.

DISTRIBUTION: Central America, East Indies, Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand.

HABITAT: Growing from buried wood on the forest floor.

Since the type no longer exists, many workers have been confused as to the specific features of S. elegans . Judged from numerous specimens examined in Kew herbarium, these call for plants with rosetted pilei, several usually arising from discrete stems and becoming apically concrescent. Pilei are thin and brittle, often appearing translucent, and spores are broadly elliptical, apiculate, 5-6 x 3-3.5 µm. The habitat also is noteworthy, plants arising from decayed wood buried in humus. As pilei vary from solitary and flabelliform to campanulate concrescent forms, pileus features are not sufficient to enable species to be identified accurately. Identifications of early workers, based on these, cannot be regarded as trustworthy; consequently the distribution given is that of authentic specimens examined in Kew herbarium, or received from collectors. The species is close to S. affine, differing in pileus shape, habitat, and slightly larger apiculate spores. Flabelliform, specimens of both, if sterile, are difficult to separate. Welden (1954, p. 437) listed as a synonym S. flabellatum Pat.; a second is S. floriforme Bres., ex "Aireys Inlet, Victoria, Miss Berthon"; and S. sowerbeii Berk. is merely a small form without any constant differentiating features.

TYPE LOCALITY: British Guiana.