69 



proportion to our acquired knowledge of mosses that they are as 

 essentially connected with fecundation as the pollen of phenogaraous 

 plants, of which they are the analogues. Many very interesting 

 examples of the infertility of certain mosses, especially of Hypna, 

 have been satisfactorily accounted for by the fact that such species 

 are dioicous, and that the simultaneous occurrence of plants of both 

 kinds is very uncommon, as to those species. On the other hand, 

 fruit is never developed unless anther-bearing plants are present. In 

 the locomotive properties of the spirilla we find the refutation of one 

 of the chief arguments against the fecundation of mosses ; for the dif- 

 fusion of these bodies during rain must be both rapid and extensive, 

 quite sufficient to insure access to the fertile flower. 



W. Wilson. 

 Warringlon, February 11, 1851. 



Note on Mr. Queketfs Monstrous Moss. 

 By W. Wilson, Esq. 



Not having yet seen Mr. Queketl's remarks in the original publi- 

 cation, I confine this note to what is said on the subject in Lindley's 

 ' Vegetable Kingdom,' article Bryaceae, where it is stated that a mass 

 of Tortula fallax, having young setae capped with calyptrae, had under- 

 gone a very remarkable change after having been grown in a Ward's- 

 case, the tendency to produce fruit having been checked, and "instead 

 of fruit a miniature forest of elevated stems, leafy above and below, 

 but in the intermediate portion destitute of leaves ;" in fact, a com- 

 plete suppression of fruit, and a conversion of those parts into leafy 

 shoots, is assumed to have been the result of the experiment. 



The 'Doctrines of Morphology' are supported by so many analogies 

 that few persons will question the propriety of regarding the calyptra 

 of a moss as one of the last convolute leaves of the axis: so far, how- 

 ever, as the fact is made to depend on Mr. Quekett's experiment, 

 there is reason to dispute it. An illustrative specimen from Mr. 

 Quekett has been in my possession for several j'ears. When pro- 

 perly examined, apart from the influence of hypothesis, it presents 

 nothing remarkable, and certainly nothing anomalous. It is not a 

 Tortula, but a very common moss, found upon every wall, called 

 Ceratodon purpureus. After due examination of the specimen, I can 

 assert, without the least hesitation, that there is absolutely no evidence 



