Parts of Fructification in Mosses. $15 
pencil, the greater part of the granules was removed. A trans- 
verse section at an earlier stage of the capsule, before the falling 
of the calyptra, exhibited, as I expected, fewer granules on the 
substance of the columella, and which were removeable in like z 
manner. Lastly, by a longitudinal section, in which, if well per- 
formed, the scalpel could not be supposed to carry any part of 
the pollen over the surface of the columella, I obtained a distinct 
view of this part, perfectly free from these supposed seeds, and 
evidently consisting of large cells filled with an uniform pulpy 
substance; a continuation of which occupied the cavity of the 
ọperculum. 
From these observations, even added to those of Schmidel 
and Hedwig, though they seem conclusive against the hypothesis 
of M. Beauvois, I by no means pretend to reason strictly re- 
specting the whole order: on the contrary, from the conversa- 
tions I have had with my ingenious and accurate friend Mr. 
Francis Bauer, as well as from some observations of my own, I 
am disposed to believe that considerable diversities may exist in 
the placentation of Mosses: that in some cases the seeds may be 
formed in a much greater portion of the columnula than in 
others: and it is even not improbable that in certain cases its 
whole substance may be converted into seeds; or, to speak more 
accurately, that it may produce seeds even to the centre, and that 
the cells in which they were probably formed may be re-ab- 
sorbed. This I am inclined to think is the case in Phascum al- 
ternifolium of Dickson, in*the ripe capsule of which there is. 
hardly the vestige of a columnula; and I have observed the same 
structure in two new species of Anodontium of Bridel; which, 
if it equally exists in the only species of this genus hitherto de- 
scribed, would perhaps considerably strengthen its cbaracter. 
In these cases the inner membrane is also-evanescent; and such 
a struc- 
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