THE SWORD MOSS. 3 



tne as follows: "If I tell you that I have searched for the fruit of 

 Phyllogoniiiiii Norvegiciiiii since the first year of my arrival in America 

 in 1847, you will understand how deeply I am obliged to you for the 

 communication of your specimen just received, and how sincerely I 

 am rejoiced to congratulate you for your discovery. I had read two 

 days ago in the Bulletin the description of the fruit and seen the fig- 

 ures you have given of it. The last number of the Revue Bryologique 

 has the description of a new species of Eustichia fruiting, E. Savatieri 

 of Japan which scarcely differs from E. Norvegica. As the specimens 

 from w^hich the description is tnade are too old and deoperculate, the 

 author could say nothing of the peristome. Your specimens are in a 

 perfect state of preservation and prove it to be gymnostomous. This 

 I think will force the removal of the genus into the Pottiaceae." The 

 specimens reached him in time to insert the description in the galley 

 proofs of his Manual of the Mosses of North America, but the first 

 forms had already been printed, so that in the Analysis of Genera on 

 page 5 it still remained as ^^ fruit unkuowu." When the Manual was 

 printed he sent me a copy with the following autograph : "To Miss 

 Elizabeth Knight, with the kindest regards of her old unknown friend, 

 Leo Lesquereux. " Specimens were also sent to Dr. Asa Gray and Prof. 

 D. C. Eaton, to Messrs. E. A. Rau and S. O. Lindberg, and also to Kew 

 and to Paris, and one went back to its native State, to the University 

 of Wisconsin. Thus began my career as a professional Bryologist. 



The Sword-moss was originally discovered by Desvaugh, where 

 and when is uncertain; he sent it to Bridel with the manuscript name 

 " Fissidens inibricatus. " Bridel printed a description of it in 1826, but 

 renamed it, placing it in a new genus of his own, Phyllogonium, and 

 supposing it came from Norway, he called it Norvegicum. Sullivant, 

 to whom belongs the honor of first finding it in North America, says: 

 " It may be doubted if this rare moss and the tropical Pterigynandriim 

 fulgens Hedwig, the type of Phyllogonium of Bridel, are referable to 

 the same genus. A striking dissimilarity — in habit, mode of growth, 

 and in the position of the female flowers which are terminal in the 

 one, but lateral in the other, as well as the structure and reticulation 

 of the leaf, all indicate their separation generically." Bridel must 

 also have doubted its close affinity to his other species of Phyllogo- 

 nium, for he created a sub-genus for it alone, and wrote its name 

 Phyllogonium Eustichia Norvegica. Following Sullivant's suggestion, 

 Brvich and Schimper, in the Bryologia Europea, raised Bridel's sub- 

 genus Eustichia to generic rank, but as the fruit was still unknown 

 could not definitely settle its relationship. 



In 1869 Mitten, in his enumeration of all the mosses of tropical 

 America, described some specimens collected by Bourgeau in the Val- 



