244 THE JOURNAL OF BOTANY 



study of lichens, and I find that I make but very Httle progress 

 with them. On looking over my collection I am astonished at 

 the great number which I have determined, to which the mark of 

 ' doubtful ' is attached. Those I am certain of are very few in 

 comparison." 



During the next twenty years he evidently continued the 

 study of the group until he mastered them, publishing papers on 

 the Eeindeer Lichen, and on the lichens of the Placodium 

 murorum group, which showed a masterly grasp of the subject ; as 

 well as a list of the lichens of Westmoreland, in the Naturalist for 

 1886-87 : this included many rare species, and several new to Great 

 Britain. Among these latter were -.—Exihcheia Martinclalei Cromb., 

 Collema isidioides Nyl. (Warton Crag, Cumberland), Collemopsls 

 ohlongans Nyl., Calicium roscidum Fkh., Parmelia isidiotyla Nyl., 

 Gyropliora sjJodochroa Ach., Lecanora flavocitrina Nyl., Lecidca 

 acutula Nyl., L. decUnascens Nyl., Platycjrapha pcriclca Nyl. 



The progress of the list was arrested by the death of his first 

 wife, which affected his own health ; it will, it is hoped, appear 

 in a complete form in the botanical section for the county (which, 

 at my suggestion, Martindale was engaged to undertake) in the 

 Victoria History of the Counties of England. 



My first acquaintance with Martindale came through J. M. 

 Barnes (1814-90) of Levens, Milnthorpe, a most genial and liberal 

 correspondent, who in 1867 sent me Westmoreland mosses in 

 exchange for those of Devon. This excellent bryologist told me 

 that he, Martindale, and George Stabler (1839-1910) used to 

 meet once a month at each other's houses, and then go out on 

 exploring expeditions. This little group of botanists did much 

 for the botany of the county, and their names are perpetuated in 

 plants they discovered in the course of their work : Barnes, in 

 Bryum B arnes ii \\ood; Stabler, in Anthroceros Stableri Steph., 

 Marsupella Stableri Sj^vuce, and Plagiochila Stableri 'Pesirson; and 

 Martindale in E])hebeia Martindalei Cromb. 



Like the majority of practical lichenologists he was not a 

 believer in the Schwendenerian theory. In a letter to me on 

 February 20th, 1912, he writes: "The Schwendenerian theory 

 creates more difliculties than it seems to solve. It is passing 

 strange that lichen gonidia should so closely resemble algae, but 

 it would be much stranger that Palmellacecs should remain for 

 untold generations in an initial stage, without going on to com- 

 plete their cycle or without dying away. This must be the case, 

 if Schwendener is right, with many imprisoned ' algie ' in the 

 thallus of lichens, that have never been known to fruit, and have 

 therefore never imprisoned any algae, since the original ger- 

 mination of the spores from which they came. There are several 

 other things altogether independent of the question of gonidia, 

 the chief of which is that the fertilisation is not effected as in the 

 Ascomycetes, that is, if we accept as correct the statements of 

 fungologists respecting them. I have myself microscopically 

 examined thousands of apothecia, and scarcely ever limited my 

 work to looking at and measuring the spores, but took in the 



