OONVEKSATION II. 



'MOSSES AOT> PERNS. 



MARY had been arranging a cushion of moss on 

 a china dish, and sticking violets and primroses 

 among its delicate fibres. This had a pretty 

 effect, and her mamma praised her spring nosegay. 

 "Will you tell us, papa," said the little girl, 

 " something about these beautiful mosses, that are 

 so bright and green long before the leaves of the 

 trees are out ?" 



" MOSSES," said her father, " are not so simple 

 in their structure as lichens, and therefore come 

 higher in the scale of vegetable life. There are 

 plants nearly related to them, called Liverworts, 

 which are of a somewhat fleshy substance, and 

 grow only in very damp places. You remember 

 finding a mass of green scales overlapping each 

 other on the damp earth near the pond ; that was 

 liverwort, and it is also to be found on trees in 

 shady and moist places. A very curious fact con- 

 nected with liverworts is, that in the little case 

 which contains the spores there is a spiral thread 



