ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY, MICROSCOPY, ETC. 213 



Brotherug, namely, Orthomniopsis and Okamursea. Having obtained 

 more complete material, Okamura is able to describe them in fuller 

 detail. 



New Mosses of Japan, China, and New Caledonia.*— J. Cardot 

 and I. Theriot publish descriptions of thirteen new species of mosses 

 collected in the Liou-kiou Archipelago by J. B. Ferris in 1898-9. 



I. Theriot f publishes diagnoses of six new species and varieties of 

 mosses collected in Japan by J. B. Feme ; four collected in the 

 Chinese province of Kouy-Tcheou by J. Cavalerie and J. Esquirol ; and 

 ten collected by M. Franc in New Caledonia. 



Chinese Mosses. J— E. G. Paris publishes a ninth article on Mosses 

 of Eastern Asia, giving a list of twenty-three species, collected by the 

 missionaries Courtois and Henry, in the Chinese provinces of Kiang-Sou 

 and N'gan-Hoei. Among them are descriptions of ten new species. 



Fissidens algarvicus.§ — G. Dismier discusses the species Fissidens 

 algarvicus, described by Solms-Laubach in 1868 from material collected 

 by him in the province of Algarve, Portugal. It w^as originally described 

 as dioicous ; but Dismier shows that the French specimens subse- 

 quently collected near Cherbourg, near Brest, and by Dismier at Banca 

 (Pyrenees), and several other localities, are mouoicous or pseudomonoicous. 

 The late Abbe Boulay, in his Mousses de France, considered that F. 

 algarvicus is a variety of F. pusillus. Dismier shows that F. algarvicus 

 is a distinct species, characterised by a special habit, by narrow leaves 

 longly and finely acuminate, or sometimes even apiculate, with a wide 

 margin reaching the apex, by the proportion and shapes of the different 

 laminae of the leaf, and by the symmetrical leptodermous capsule. 



Formation of Leucobryum Cushions. || — W. H. Burrell gives his 

 opinion as to the factors which control the formation of the unattached 

 cushions in which the moss Leucobryum glaucum often occurs under 

 beech trees. The factors are three : — 1. Special cell-structure, enabling 

 the plant to store water. 2. Formation of vegetative buds from rhizoids 

 on the leaves. 3. Repeated accidental disturbance. The spongy leaf- 

 tissue retains moisture for a long time, and relieves the plant from 

 the necessity of maintaining a connection with the ground by means 

 of rhizoids. Buds arise from the reddish-brown tomentum which is 

 formed on the surface of the leaves, and develop into new plants ; 

 and as they develop upon whichever surface of the cushion happens 

 to be uppermost, they at length produce a radiating structure in the 

 cushion, if it be disturbed from time to time. The agents which roll the 

 cushions over are, in the opinion of the author, pheasants and other 

 animals in active search for beech-nuts. 



Bucegia romanica.1T— V. Schiffner writes of the occurrence of the 

 liverwort Bucegia romanica (first described from Roumania by Radian 



* Bull. Acad. Internat. Geog. Bot. xviii. (1908) pp. ii-iii. 

 t Tom. cit., pp. 250-4. % Rev. Bryolog.,xxxvi. (1909) pp. 8-13. 



§ Rev. Bryolog., xxxv. (1908) pp. 137-9. 



II Trans. Norfolk and Norwich Nat. Soc, viii. (1908) pp. 537-9. 

 1 Magyar Bot. Lapok, vii. (1908) pp. 36-9. 



