136 ON ANOMOCLADA. 



indeed unique among the whole of the foliose Jungermaimidece ; but I 

 have satisfied myself, by the most scrupulous examination, of its exact- 

 ness and constancy, for the stem is continued beneath the origin of 

 the branches without any break, and does not turn up to become the 

 axis of the intiorpscence, then start off anew as an innovation, i.e., as a 

 distinct branch in very nearly the same direction as the stem, which 

 is the ordinary structure in many apparently lateral inflorescences. 

 Among the frondose Jungermannidecs and the Marchantiacece, female 

 flowers springing from the upper side of the costa are not so infre- 

 quent ; e.g. (in the former) in Sijmphijogyna, Morkia, Pallavicinia, 

 Gray [Blyttia, Endl., Syn. Hep.); (in the latter) in Aitoiiia, Forst. 

 {Plagiochasma, N., Syn. Ilep.), and Clerea, Lindberg; and all the 

 three genera of Anthoceroteee (not so widely apart from Jungennan- 

 nidece as commonly supposed) have antical $ flowers. In Symphyo- 

 gyna the twin cord of opaque ligneous tissue, in the axis of the 

 pellucid costa, allows us to easily trace the continuity of the costa 

 beneath the origin of the J flowers. The same thing equally exists 

 in Pallavicinia, but is not so obvious, and although I gathered nume- 

 rous fruiting specimens oi P. LyeUi, Hook., in the Peruvian Andes, I 

 cannot find among them a single instance of the " involucrum primo 

 tcrminale, deiu ad spcciem dorsale," which is part of the generic cha- 

 racter in " Synopsis Hepaticarum " (p. 474). Such a terminal inflo- 

 rescence may exist, but it must be veiy exceptional ; on the other 

 hand, very young $ flowers may be seen springing forth from the 

 middle of the upper surface of full-grown fronds — sometimes two or 

 three contemporaneously — at short distances apart. 



In J flowers of these two genera, and of Ilorhia, that have re- 

 mained unfertilised, the involucres are sometimes abnormally enlarged, 

 and enable us to see that their structure is really not very different 

 from that of Anomoclada, consisting as they do of two or three rows 

 of tristichous bifid bracts, whose form is often obscured in the fertilised 

 flowers by thoseof the inner row becoming connate, and the lobes again 

 cloven or toothed, and by those of the outer row adhering to them in 

 the form of scales or wings. There is not, however, any near affinity of 

 Anomoclada to any of those genera, as every skilled hepaticologist will 

 readily see, so that it is needless to ])oint out the ditt'erences. The 

 frondose character is really, by itself, of slight import, as its transi- 

 tion into the foliose is easily traceable. In some frondose species the 

 frond seems a direct extension of the prothallium, the only difference 

 being that in the frond there is a more or less distinct separation into 

 costa and pagina — a midrib bordered on each side by a thin flat folia- 

 ceous wing. In the fronds of some species the margin is unbroken, 

 but in Symphyogyna sinuata, ISw., the pagina is sinuato-pinatifid, 

 and in S. Bronyniartii, ^[ont., pinnatipartite — sometimes almost down 

 to the midrib. The next sta};c iu tlie process of transmuting frond 

 into leaves is afforded by Cephalozia integrifoUa, n.sp., which has 

 ovate-oblong subcontiguous leaves, inserted almost parallel to the axis 

 of the stem, or with tlu; <>liglitest appreciable inclination ; and very 

 rarely a few consecutive leaves are reunited into a continuous pinna- 

 titid pagina, simulating that of the Symphyogyna:. In other species of 

 Cephaloxia each leaf becomes more or less deeply bifid, which is the 

 normal condition of the species of this genus. 

 {2'o be continued,'^ 



