ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY, MICROSCOPY, ETC. 613 



Mexican Mosses.*— J. Cardot publishes a sixth instalment of his 

 preliminary diagnoses of Mexican mosses. He describes thirteen 

 species and two varieties of Brachythecium and Rhgnchostegium. The 

 specimens cited were collected chiefly by Pringle. 



Bryophytes of New Caledonia. f — I. Theriot publishes a list of mosses 

 from Caledonia collected by M. Franc. The list contains diagnoses of 

 one new genus, twenty-two new species, and nine new varieties. The 

 new genus is Franciella, and is distinguished from Spiridens by the 

 great length of the pedicel (4 cm.), the shortness of the operculum, and 

 the tissue of the leaves. In another list he enumerates seven other 

 species which are new records for the island. In a third list he gives 

 F. Stephani's determinations of the hepatics collected at the same time — 

 seventeen species. 



Japanese Bryophytes. J — S. Okamura describes Isotachis MaMnoi, a 

 new species of liverworts from Yaku-Shima. The text is in Japauese. 



He also§ gives a list of thirty-six mosses from the province of 

 Etchu, and among them the new species Haplohymenium brachycladon 

 Okam. 



Specific Types versus Formenreihen. || — J. Roll renews the dis- 

 cussion of specific types versus series of forms, replying to Le Roy 

 Andrews. Roll maintains that the proper way to do systematic work is 

 to go afield and collect specimens extensively, to study all the forms and 

 group them together in series of forms (Formenreihen). The system 

 of describing as a specific type the first specimen found is artificial and 

 unnatural, and leads to the ignoring of all intermediate and divergent 

 forms because they do not fit in with the type. In the " Formen- 

 reihen " method, special attention is paid to all these intermediate 

 forms, because the purpose is to connect the species together, not to 

 separate them artificially. In Sphagnology we ought not to bind our- 

 selves to a system, but to learn to understand the speech of nature. 



Specific Names of Sphagnum. f — J. Roll gives a list of names of 

 species of Sphagnum, which, in point of priority, are in accord with the 

 rules of the International Botanical Congress at Vienna, 1905. And 

 with them he gives their synonyms. The list contains sixteen of these 

 prior names and their dates. 



Congress Notes.** — J. Roll gives a short account of the conclusions 

 reached at the International Botanical Congress in Brussels, especially 

 in regard to the nomenclature of mosses. 1. It was decided that the 

 starting-point in nomenclature for the hepatics and Sphagnum should be 

 Linnams's Genera Plantarum (1753), and for the mosses Hedwig's 

 Species Muscorum (1801). 2. A committee was appointed to prepare a 

 list of Nomina conservanda. ?>. Since the Congress was concerned with 

 generic names, and not with specific, it did not deal with his suggestions 



* Eev. Bryolog., xxxvii. (1910) pp. 65-72. 



f Bull. Acad. Internat. Geogr. Bot., xix. (1910) pp. 96-104. 



t Tokvo Bot. Mag., xxiv. (1910) pp. (50) (51). 



§ Tom. cit., pp. (197) (198). 



i| Allgem. Bot. Zeitsckr., xvi. (1910) pp. 53-5. 



i Tom. cit., pp. 70-1. ** Tom. cit., pp. 86-7. 



