NOTES ON NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES OF RICCIA* 



Marshall A. Howe 



(with plate iii) Lmi^^g 



RicciA Beyrichiana Hampe and RrcciA Lescurl\na Austin ^ffiW Vo 



Riccia Beyrichiana I Have discussed briefly on two former occasions,' but A«*C 



will here review some of the main points in its history, even at the risk of re- 

 peating some of the things that have elsewhere been said about it. The species 

 was originally described in Lehmann's " Pugillus Septimus", published in Ham- 

 burg in 1838. The name was attributed to "Hampe Ms". It is probable, 

 however, that the description was written by Lindenberg, whose classical mono- 

 graph of the Ricciaceae had been published two years earlier, though Linden- 

 berg's name appears only in the preface to Lehmann's work. The plant is said 

 to have been collected in North America, between Jefferson and Gainesville, by 

 a German botanical traveler, Beyrich. From what is known of Beyrich's travels 

 it is evident that the Jefferson and Gainesville in question are in northern Georgia, 

 where towns bearing these names are county seats about twenty miles apart. 

 Until recent years Riccia Beyrichiana remained apparently unknown except 

 from the original description. In some critical notes on the American species 

 of Riccia, published by Professor Underwood in The Botanical Gazette in 1894, 

 Riccia Beyrichiana was omitted on the ground that there was no recent evidence 

 that it was a member of our flora. In 1898, however, Stephani, in his Species 

 Hepaticaruni'^ stated that he had seen Beyrich's plant, that it was collected in 

 Jefferson, North America, and that it is doubtless a good species. And he gives 

 a new description of it. Three years later, in 1901, I wrote to the Naturhis- 

 torisches Hofmuseum in Vienna, where the Lindenberg herbarium is preserved, 

 and secured for study the pocket containing the apparent type of the species. 

 I then published some notes on it, expressing the opinion that the species was a 

 valid one and adding to the previous descriptions a more detailed account of the 

 spores. Three years ago, after the meeting of the American Association for the 

 Advancement of Science and the Botanical Society of America at Atlanta, 

 Georgia, I took advantage of the opportunity to visit Jefferson and Gainesville 

 and some of the intervening territory, with the hope and purpose of rediscover- 



1 Bull. Torrey Club 38: 161-165. 1901. 

 Jour. N. Y. Bot. Gard. 15S 60-63. I9i4- 



2 Bull. Herb. Boiss. 6: 318. 



* Abstracted and revised from an illustrated paper presented under a slightly different title 

 before the SuUivant Moss Society at its New York meeting, December 29, 1916. 



