LIVERWORTS 123 



Liverwort (Jungermannia sphcerocarpa) . In some 

 cases they are solitary that is to say, only one 

 arrows in the axil of the leaf while in others a 



O 



small group of them will he found collected 

 together under cover of a single leaf. 



The fertilising organs, instead of being sausage- 

 or cucumber-shaped, as in the mosses, are usually 

 round or oval, as in Plate IX. fig. 6, where I 

 have drawn two, taken from that very common 

 little plant, the Whitish Liverwort (Diplophyllum 

 albicans), the acquaintance of which we have 

 already made. That this little round body is 

 extremely minute may be realised from the fact 

 that those given have been magnified some fifty- 

 one times, and that even then they appear no 

 larger than a small pea. 



And here let me pause to point out a very 

 striking resemblance that exists between the 

 general form of the liverwort fertilising organs 

 (antheridia) , as above illustrated, and those of 

 certain of the mosses, which seems to indicate 

 another point of contact between the two tribes. 

 We have seen that in the mosses these organs 

 nearly always assume that curious sausage-like 

 shape which has already been referred to several 

 times; in the Bog-mosses (Sphagna), however, 

 they are round, like the similar organs of a 

 liverwort, from which, indeed, it is difficult to 

 distinguish them, as will at once be apparent if 

 reference is made to fig. 20 of Plate IX., where a 



