MOSSES. 



63 



1. PHASCUM. 



2. GYMNOSTUMUM. 



sandy and clayey banks, and perfects its fruit in April. 

 Edward has it from Kent, and I from Wiltshire and 

 Herefordshire. Twenty plants 

 grow together in a patch the size 

 of a sixpence. 



The Alternate-leaved Earth- 

 moss is common in the spring 

 upon fallow clay-ground : it has 

 a branch rising higher than its 

 capsule, or urn ; the Serrated 

 Earth-moss, the Clustered and 

 Strap-leaved Earth-mosses are exceedingly minute and 

 evanescent. 



The Weissias form the next group ; it includes the 

 Beardless Mosses, the true "Weissias, and the Streak 

 Mosses. 



The Beardless Mosses (Gymnostomum) have no fringe 

 on the margin of the urn, hence their name. They are 

 small plants growing on rocks, or earth, in thick tufts; 

 both the lid and the veil are beaked. 



The Curve-beaked Beardless Moss (G. curvirostre, 

 Plate V., Jig. 2). 



Then there are the Small-mouthed Beardless Moss, and 

 the Spreading Beardless Moss, and the Curly-leaved 

 Beardless Moss, all of which are characterized by the urn 

 being contracted at the opening. 



The Bev. Hugh Macmillan, in his "Footnotes from the 

 Page of Nature," tells us that Solomon s " Hyssop on the 

 wall " is identical with the little Beardless Moss, Gymnos- 

 tomum truncatulum. He adduces the authority of Has- 

 selquist, who called it Hyssopus Solomonis, and described 



