+, 
>. 
some instances from the greater size of their component cells and 
the distinctness of their contents, and, in others, from the rapidity 
of their development and the readiness with which they can be 
cultivated in a form rendering them easy of microscopical examin- 
ation. Whatever may be the reason, an erroneous opinion has 
certainly been prevalent respecting them. Schleiden, in his 
“Principles of Scientific Botany,” made the strange assertion, 
“ Lichens offer little worthy of notice,”—a statement echoed, if I 
mistake not, by Dr. Lankester. The remark of the eminent Swiss 
lichenographer, Schirer, is sometimes quoted, that the texture of 
Lichens is too dense and compact to permit their satisfactory 
examination under the microscope; but a look at the context 
shows that he was speaking of the difficulty he should himself find, 
at his advanced age, in cutting sections sufficiently fine. 
But if it is to be regretted that Lichens have attracted the 
attention of so few scientific observers, it is not a matter for much 
wonder that they have not greatly aroused the curiosity of the 
unscientific. They are in general too subdued in colour, there is 
too great a sameness and monotony in their circular outlines, or 
vagueness in the indefinite patches they form, as they spread over 
rock, tree, or earth, to draw upon themselves the notice of the 
people. Many of them indeed are so minute, that a large rock or 
an aged tree might be covered with them and yet they would be 
invisible to a person standing but a short distance away. In such 
cases the only thing that indicates their presence is a delicate 
suffusion of various shades, which has excited the admiration of 
poet and painter, but is not pronounced enough to waken interest 
in the uneducated mind. Looked at more closely, however, we 
find them, like all else in Nature, clothed with beauty. Let us 
assist our feeble sight with a magnifying glass, and there are few 
that do not show an elegance of contour, charming to the eye and 
wonderful to reflect upon. 
“Handsome is as handsome does” is an old saying, and had 
our Lichens been found of some economic use, they might, in 
spite of their external insignificance, have come in for some share 
of attention. But as they lack striking features, so also they want 
