4 HISTORY OF BRITISH 3I0SSES. 



for, as far as Britain is concerned, it has been computed 

 by Dr. Johnston, in speaking of tlie genus Ilj/pnum, that it 

 forms perhaps a fourth part of the vegetable clothing of this 

 island. The first vegetation that appears on new buildings 

 evidencing itself by green stains, on recently raised coral- 

 reefs, and on volcanic ashes, is composed chiefly of the 

 young confervoid shoots of Mosses ; and when these have 

 by their decay prepared a small film of vegetable mould, 

 they yield their place to plants of more complicated struc- 

 ture, till at length trees of colossal ^growth cover what was 

 once a barren' waste. This fact alone shows their vast im- 

 portance in the economy of nature. TThen the Creator of 

 all beheld everything he had made, and said it was " very 

 good," the humble moss was equally his care and delight 

 with the lofty monarch of the forest, and therefore in it 

 should we see His power and goodness displayed. 



Again, the benefit of the study of these minute objects 

 is not less beneficial, but rather more so, on account of mi- 

 nuteness, and it is with pleasure that I avail myself of a few 

 paragraphs much to the point on this subject, from the ar- 

 ticle " Musci" in the Edinburgh Encyclopredia, vol. xv. " it 

 has been observed by a writer equally elegant and j^rofound 

 (Pascal), that ' man is placed in the middle between the two 



