48 FOOTNOTES FROM 



are nearly a hundred species indigenous to Great Britain 

 and Ireland, some of which are so small as to be scarcely 

 visible, and others much larger than any of the true 

 mosses. With the exception of a few prominent species, 

 which are found in every moist wood and on every 

 shady rock, they are very local and limited in their dis- 

 tribution, many of them being remarkably rare, and 

 confined to remote and isolated localities. Perhaps the 

 greatest number of species occurs in the tropics; and no- 



A 



Fio. 2. JUNOERMANTJIJK COMPLANATA. 



where do they luxuriate so much as in the dark woods 

 and mountain ravines of New Zealand. Some of them 

 grow in the bleakest spots in the world, and are to be 

 found even at a higher altitude than the urn mosses on 

 the great mountain ranges of the globe. They form the 

 faintest, dimmest tint of green on the edges of eternal 

 glaciers, and on the bare storm-seamed ridges of the Alps 

 and Andes, where not a tuft of moss or a trace of other 

 vegetation can be seen; and this almost imperceptible 

 film of verdure, when cleansed from the earth and mois- 



