BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, ETC. 63 



reference to its place of publication. The only additional information 

 supplied by the author is that the "nuts" of the Dimorphmulra ap- 

 peared in commerce last year as "kola nuts." Mr. Christy is 

 " continuing the research with the hopes of being able to find that 

 the Diniorphandra Mora contains some food product which may be 

 turned to account. Perhaps," he adds, "I may receive this before 

 this paper is printed." But he didn't, and we may be allowed to 

 wonder why the paper was printed at all, and still more why a 

 shilling should be charged for it. 



A Parliamentary paper has just been issued regarding a new 

 food for cattle — a compound of molasses and peat powder — which 

 has been perfected in Germany. The latter ingredient, we are 

 informed by the Daily Graphic of Jan. 15th, is obtained from 

 "the dried roots of the familiar mosses ' sphagnum cuspidatum ' 

 and ' eriophorum latifolium.' " Sphagnum has no roots, and Erio- 

 phorxim is hardly a moss. 



Moss-STUDENTS will notc with satisfaction the appearance of 

 Part xvii. of Dr. Braithwaite's British Moss-Flora (London : 303, 

 Clapham Eoad, S.W. pp. iv, 36 ; tabb. 85-90. Price 6s.), in which 

 is begun the consideration of the pleurocarpous mosses. The first 

 family treated — Ht/pnacea; — is a difficult one to arrange satis- 

 factorily, owing to the strong family likeness prevalent among 

 its members ; and the generic systems adopted by authors have 

 varied between the one extreme of condensation into a single genus 

 to the other extreme of disruption into scores of genera often 

 separated from one another on the flimsiest of pretexts. Dr. 

 Braithwaite, it appears, will follow a middle course. The present 

 part contains the subfamily LeskecB (Thuidium with six species, 

 Leskea with three, Anomodon with three), and part of Awblystegitim 

 — the beginning of subfamily Hypnea. Amblysteyium has been 

 vastly augmented by the addition of five groups of Hypna (e. g. 

 Harpidiiwi and Limnobium). In the present part, however, beyond 

 the thirteen species of EiuDiiblystcf/ium, only one of the additional 

 groups appears — CawpyUadeJphus, with five species. To return to 

 Thuidium, Dr. Braithwaite is to be congratulated for repairing an 

 omission of which other books and lists of British Mosses are 

 guilty. He has not failed to include in the genus T. hystricosum 

 Mitt., which was published in this Journal in 1863. Wilson 

 separated the plant in his herbarium under the manuscript name 

 Hypniim calcicola ; but Mitten's name seemed to have become 

 forgotten. Husnot, however, just mentioned it in his Muscoloyia 

 Gallica, and Limpricht acknowledged and redescribed it in Raben- 

 horst's Kryptoijamen- Flora. As to another species of Tliuidiun), it 

 will be fresh in the memory of readers that in the last number of 

 this Journal T. Philiberti Limpr. was recognized by Mr. H. N. 

 Dixon as a species which he has found in this country. This 

 notice was, however, too late for Dr. Braithwaite to figure the 

 plant in the newly published part of his Moss- Flora. — A. G. 



Another important contribution to the literature of Mosses is 

 Part iii. of General Paris's Index Bryoloyicus (Paris : Klinksieck. 

 Dec. 1896. pp. 645-964. Price fr. 12-50). 'Beginning with Hypnum 



