HANDBOOK OF BRITISH HEPATIC/E. 237 



over the lower half. Capsule spherical, chocolate- 

 brown, valves four, recurved when empty. Spores 

 sphaeroidal, dark tawny, 15/x diam. Male shoots 

 more slender. Antheridia one to three together, 

 oval, axilliary, pedunculate. 



Gymnomitrium coralloides, Nets. 



Barren shoots irregularly fasciculate, much 

 compressed, lanceolate, subfalcate, sometimes 

 deformed ; leaves crowded, closely imbricate, 

 roundish-ovate, retuse ; margin broad, scari- 

 ose, seldom entire. Fertile shoots clavate ; 

 involucral leaves obscurely emarginate ; 

 margin plane, erose-denticulate. 



Gymnomitrium coralloides, Nees Europ. 

 Leberm. I., p. 418 ; Gott. and Rab. Exs. Nos. 

 79, 383, 513 ; Carr. and Pears. Exs. No. 216 ; 

 Carr. Brit. Hep. p. 7, t. i., fig. 4 ; Cooke 

 Hep. f. 21, 22. 



Rare on Scotch mountains. 



Patches dark brown or nearly black, forming dense 

 tufts. Stems ascending, rigid, irregularly branched. 

 Fertile shoots strongly compressed, obtuse above, 

 the remainder lanceolate. Flagellae creeping, inter- 

 laced, dark brown, with paler delicate rootlets. 

 Leaves closely imbricated and brittle (fig. 162), 

 broadly ovate, obtuse, very concave, bluntly emargi- 

 nate, sometimes nearly entire, sometimes irregularly 

 eroded or crenulate, thin, glaucous, and delicate. 

 Dioicous. Involucral leaves closely imbricated, 



