2~j i Dr. Sm ith's Characters of Jlookeria. 



tification of this plant at all, though he has figured the leaf with 

 its remarkable terminal radicles. With regard to his Anictan- 

 ghun bulbosurn, this illustrious muscologist has himself made a 

 greater mistake, in consequence of the young state of the cap- 

 sules which it fell to his lot to examine, and which seem in that 

 respect much like some preserved in the Linnaean herbarium. 

 In these he could find no fringe, and therefore referred the plant 

 to his Anictangium. I had lately however the pleasure of receiv- 

 ing some more perfect ones from my friend Labillardiere, who 

 has figured this moss in his work on New Holland plants, t. 253. 

 f. 1, by the name of Leskea pennata. In these specimens the 

 perktom'uim is sufficiently apparent, and is thai of a Leskea. 

 Thus these two plants are brought together under one genus, my 

 Hypnum. We must next examine how they may together be se- 

 parated from thence in order to constitute a genus by themselves, 

 which the striking peculiarity of their habit so imperiously re- 

 quires. This, I think, may with certainty be done, both ac- 

 cording to my principles founded on the capsule, as in Mnium 

 and Bartramia, and according to those of Dr. Mohr, derived 

 from the calyptra or veil. 



The capsule of both these mosses is all over curiously reticu- 

 lated or dotted, in a different and more remarkable manner than 

 that of any Hypnum known to me. This I think will afford one 

 generic mark. The calyptra may, by most botanists, be thought 

 to yield a better distinction, being not only most curiously reti- 

 culated, so as in a dry state to be in every part cellular, which 

 I have not seen in any other moss, but it moreover comes off en- 

 tire, never splitting longitudinally like that of every genuine 

 Hypmtm that I have had an opportunity of examining. I have 

 not indeed seen this part in all the exotic species hereafter men- 

 tioned, but I have no apprehension of its being materially dif- 

 ferent 



