122 THE WOODLANDS. 



The variety of form is so great as almost to baffle 

 any general description. That which is applicable to 

 one group is not applicable to another. Sometimes 

 they so closely resemble forms of microscopical fungi 

 as to puzzle botanists themselves. The fruiting organs 

 are usually a kind of disc, or flattened cup, seated on 

 a thin leathery substance, often corrugated, but with- 

 out veins, and more like a piece of seaweed than a 

 leaf or a moss, or sometimes without any apparent 

 substratum. 



For instance, " old man's beard," l or " beard- 

 moss," is found on old forest trees, especially firs, of 

 a greyish, or greenish-yellow colour, forming shaggy 

 tufts. Each filament is branched, and these branches 

 have secondary thread-like branches throughout their 

 entire length. The cup, or fruit-bearer, is surrounded 

 by a fringe of similar threads. In olden times its use 

 was extolled in medicine ; in modern times the bird- 

 :stuffer uses it to decorate the stumps and twigs, on 

 which his birds are perched. 



The " Horse-tail Lichen," 2 hangs also in tufts on the 

 branches of old fir-trees, but the filaments are thinner 

 than in the last, much divided, and interlaced, but 

 without the bristling side-shoots of the " old man's 

 beard." The cups are rarely met with, small, and 

 not fringed. The common conditions of this lichen 

 .are rather like tufts of hair when seen hanging from 

 the boughs. With closer examination this resemblance 

 vanishes. 



The boughs of old ash-trees, 3 as well as the trunks, 



1 Usnea barbata. 3 Ramalina fraxinea. 



2 Cornicularia julata. 



