﻿190 Howe : New American Hepaticae 



crescentic in cross-section when moist, rigid and canaliculate or 

 subconvolute on drying, dark-purple beneath, very obscurely 

 areolate and porose above, solid in texture, the air-chambers 

 almost wholly filled by secondary walls ; scales small, purple, in 

 a single series on either side of the costa, reniform or ovate, the 

 anterior abruptly narrowed to a lanceolate or filiform reddish- 

 purple point, which very rarely exceeds the apical margin : mon- 

 oicous : androecia and 9 branches on small latero-ventral inno- 

 vations, those bearing a 9 branch expanded, emarginate, bilobed 

 or somewhat obcordate, 2-3 mm. long, 1-2.5 mm. in maximum 

 width, with filiform-pointed inflexed scales at apex, androecium- 

 bearing innovations smaller, scarcely expanded distally : 9 re- 

 ceptacle subhemispherical, lightly papulose, becoming nearly 

 smooth, 2-2.5 mm - m maximum width, with distinct and finally 



divergent lobes, maturing 1-4 (commonly 2 or 3) sporogonia, 

 pilose-barbate beneath ; pseudoperianth white, the exserted por- 

 tion conical or conical-oblong, about 8-cleft, the segments often 

 free with age; peduncle pale straw-colored, 1 — 1 . 5 cm. high, 

 pilose at first, becoming naked : capsule circumscissile near the 

 middle; spores brown, opaque, 75-90 fx f very minutely gran- 

 ulose papillate, the angles with a narrow concolorous margin, 

 the faces exhibiting a few low ridges, these often uniting to form 

 2-4 shallow rather irregular areolae across each face, the more 

 mature and opaque spores appearing simply warty-rugose in out- 

 line or subentire ; elaters brown, 140-220 jx long, 15-21 fx 

 greatest width, bispiral, obtuse, occasionally branched. 



in 



Colomas, State of Sinaloa, Mexico (alt. 3000 ft.), (Dr. J. N. 

 Rose, July 18, 1897); also, plants with quite immature sporogo- 

 nia, by the same collector, in the Sierra Madre at Tepic, Mexico, 

 Aug. 1897. 



Asterella lateralis is an ally of A. Bolandcri (Aust.) Underw., 

 but differs in the somewhat smaller 9 receptacle, in the usually 

 8-cleft instead of 10-12-cleft pseudoperianth, and very markedly 

 in the character of the spores and elaters — the spores of A. Bo- 

 landcri being deeply alveolate-areolate (4-6 meshes across each 

 face) with a conspicuous pellucid margin, the elaters being 200- 

 250 }i long and only 8-10 /x in width. As in A. Bolandcri, a ten- 

 dency to dioicism is observed. 



The only other species of Asterella with androecia and ? 

 branches on small postical innovations known to us, outside of the 

 American A. Bolandcri and A. violacca, are two species from 



