384 Mr. Hooker's Observations on Andratt!. 



Ehrhart has a different function assigned to it, surely it would 

 be better to retain the old name of operculum, to Avhich it has 

 full as much right as the part which occupies 'the same place in 

 Phasciim, and even more so ; for in Andr<ea it is sometimes of a 

 different colour, and is always of a different texture, from the 

 capsule. Dr. Roth doubts whether the seeds may not, while in 

 the capsule, be fixed to filaments of a similar nature to those of 

 the JungermanuicE ; but, in all the species I have had an oppor- 

 tunity of examining, I have not been able to observe any thing 

 of the kind. 



Thus was Andr(Ea removed from one order to another, as if its 

 parts of fructification were among the minutest of the vegetable 

 kingdom, or among the most difficult to examine, till the late 

 Dr. Mohr in his Tlora Germanica, (of which he sent an unedited 

 copy to his friend Mr. Turner a little before his death,) by a cort- 

 cise definition of the two orders Musci and Hepatica, satisfac- 

 torily established it as belonging to the former of these, which 

 he calls " operculatce,"* but he has still persisted in calling the 

 valves of the capsule a peristomium. 



Having thus delivered my opinion as to the order to which 

 Andrcea properly belongs, it remains for me to say a few words 

 upon the place which in that order it ought to occupy; and here 

 I trust no doubt can be entertained of the propriety of placing 



• * Dr. Mohr's 6th order of the class Cryptogamia, which he calls " CalyplratcB," is 

 divided into 



a. Operculatce, containing all ihe true Musci, among which Andrcea stands 

 the last ; 



I. Deoperculatce, which includes all the Hepaticce. 



However excellent the definitions of these subdivisions may be, it seems hardly ne- 

 cessary to alter the old terms of Musci and Hepatica. See Dr. Smith's Flora Bri- 

 lannica, 1099, HOI. 



it 



