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XII. Some Obserxations on the Parts of Fructification in Mosses ; 

 zcith Characters and Descriptions of Tzvo New Genera of that 

 Order. Bij Mr. Robert Broun, Lib. Linn. Soc. 



Read June 20th, ISO9. 



The account which the celebrated Hedwig has given of the sexes 

 of Mosses, seems to be founded on so ample an induction, and is 

 now so generally received, that it must be necessary to notice- 

 the arouments which mere theoretical Botanists have from time 

 to time produced against it. There is, however, one author,. 

 Mons- Palisot Beauvois, who has not only objected to the ac- 

 count ©f Hedwig, but has proposed a theory of his own, and 

 ■who consequently appealing to actual observations, and appear- 

 ing to have particularly studied, specifically at least, this tribe of 

 plants, merits some attention. The earliest account of Mons.. 

 Beauvois' theory is to be found in the observations added to the 

 order Musci in the Genera Plantarum of Jussieu ; and it was. 

 soon after more fully given by the author himself, in a Memoir 

 on the Sexual Organs of Mosses, published in the third volume 

 of the American Philosophical Transactions : since that time he 

 has in his different works occasionally treated of the same 

 subject, and has lately repeated the substance of his original 

 essay, in the introduction to his " Prodrome de Cinquieme et Siri- 

 eme Families de I'jEthiogamie," published at Paris in 1805, a 

 translation of which is given by my friend Mr. Konig, in the 

 second volume of the Annals of Botany. To this work, as it must* 



be 



