_Habitat_ & _Distribution_: This fungus is not uncommon on the edges of paths, in pine woods just pushing up through the soil surface. Ascomycetes ~Elaphomyces granulatus~ Fries Harts’ truffle _Description_: Fruit-body: globose to ovoid, 20-40 mm broad, pale ochraceous, covered in small pyramidal warts, and when it is cut it shows three layers, an outer thin yellowish zone, an inner thicker compact white zone and within this a purplish black area full of spores separated into chambers by bands of sterile white tissue; the first two zones make up the ‘rind’. Spores: spherical, blackish brown, warty, 24-32 µm in diameter; eight contained in globose asci. _Habitat_ & _Distribution_: This fungus is not uncommon in the surface layers of pine woods at the junction of needle debris and mineral soil. _E. muricatus_ Fries is similar, but differs in the marbled flecked interior. ~Tuber aestivum~ Vittadini English truffle _Description_: Fruit-body: subglobose except for basal flattening, up to 80 mm broad, covered in 5-6-sided pyramidal scales, dark brown to violaceous, white then greyish brown within, separated by a network of veins radiating from the basal cavity. Spores: very large, ellipsoid, light or yellowish brown and ornamented with a prominent network, borne in two’s and sixes in subglobose asci and variable in size, 20-40 × 15-30 µm. [Illustration: Plate 81. Subterranean fungi and fungus-parasites] _Habitat_ & _Distribution_: This fungus is to be found buried in the surface layers of soil in beech woods. _T. rufum_ is smaller and smoother and the spores are not crested but simply minutely spiny. _Illustrations_: _R. luteolus_--Hvass 322; LH 215. _El. granulatus_--Hvass 325; LH 49. _T. aestivum_--LH 43. _Melanogaster variegatus_--LH 215 (see p. 243). _Hymenogaster tener_--LH 215 (see p. 243). (ix) Fungal parasites ~Nyctalis parasitica~ (Fries) Fries Pick-a-back-toadstool _Description_: Plate 81. Cap: bell-shaped then becoming expanded, silky dirty white, but gradually grey with a flush of lilac with age. Stem: slender, white and smooth except for the base. Gills: pallid but soon becoming brownish, adnate or adnate with tooth, thick and distant alternately long and short and contorted or united with age. Flesh: dark brown. Spore-print: buff. Spores: small, hyaline under the microscope, ovoid, 5-6 × 3-4 µm but usually replaced completely or in part by ovoid, smooth, thick-walled and pale brownish asexually produced spores (chlamydospores) measuring about 15 × 10 µm in size. _Habitat_ & _Distribution_: This fungus grows in clusters on old decaying specimens of various species of _Russula_ and _Lactarius_ (Russulaceae)--see p. 45.