MISCELLANEA BRYOLOGICA 353 



lanosum, adding as further localities Ceylon, Gardner ; Hong-kong, 

 Boivring ; and the Pacific Is. Subsequently he referred it to 

 Aerohryum, and it has been more recently placed by Brotherus 

 in Aerobry 02)818. 



A good deal of ingenuity has been expended since that time in 

 seeking to elucidate the differences between this and the well- 

 known, wide-spread, and highly variable Aerbroyop8i8 longi88i7na 

 (Doz. & Molk.) Fleisch. Thus Brotherus separates the two species 

 by vegetative characters, assigning to A. Ia7i osa cevt^in distinguish- 

 ing features (" etwas starre, mit flach beblatterten Astschen ; 

 Blatter an der Spitze nicht oder kaum querrunzelig ") which are 

 neither attributed by Mitten to his plant nor borne out by his 

 specimens. Again, Fleischer, in Musci .... voji Buitenzorg, iii, 

 786, gives some characters of his own (one of which is directly 

 at variance with that given by Brotherus), and adds characters 

 drawn from the peristome which, whatever their value, could not 

 be considered as specific characters of Mitten's type, since none 

 of the specimens cited by him were fruiting. Paris retains both 

 species, but the synonymy he gives only adds, if possible, to the 

 confusion. 



All this ingenuity is, I am convinced, misplaced. Mitten never 

 intended to separate his plants from A. longis8ima at all, as will 

 be evident by a study of what he wa^ites on the subject. In Muse. 

 Ind. Or. he makes no reference to the Meteormm longissivmm 

 Doz. & Molk. of the Muse, frond, ined, Archip. ind. This does not 

 mean that he considered his plant distinct ; it is far more likely 

 that he overlooked the resemblance (or identity) of the two. Had 

 M. longissimum been before him he could hardly have failed to 

 compare his plants wnth that, rather than, as he does, with 

 M. auronitens and M. filamentosum, neither of which certainly 

 resembles his M. lanosum so closely. 



In his Hst of Samoan Mosses (Journ. Linn. Soc, 1868, p. 170) 

 Mitten records his species from Tutuila thus : " Aerohryum 

 lano8um Mitten in Journ. of the Proceed, of the Linn. Soc, 1859, 

 Suppl. p. 90 {Meteormm). {M. longissimum, Doz. et Molk., Musci 

 Archip. Ind. t. 48 ? et Bryol. Javan. t. 202, var. tenue.)" This 

 alone renders it perfectly clear that, if not quite convinced of the 

 identity of his A. lanosum with the original of M. longissimum — of 

 which he had probably not seen specimens — Mitten at any rate 

 had no intention of separating his plant from it. His further note 

 on M. vitianum confirms my view, if there were any need, for he 

 writes : " Notwithstanding Sullivant's remark that in Aerohryum 

 longissimum there are no papillae, I find them present in authentic 

 specimens of that moss as ivell as in the Samoan specirnens [italics 

 mine] , clearly implying that he considered the Samoan specimens 

 belonged to that species." The succeeding paragraph explains why 

 he retained his specific name instead of adopting the earlier name 

 longissivmm. " The specific name ' longissimum ' was applied by 

 Eaddi to a Brazilian moss which may prove to be referable to this 

 genus." 



I think I have shown that there is no reason to suppose that 



