io8 Cruise of the "Alert." 



and there it excavates a tunnel through the soft moss and turfy 

 soil, and at a distance of more than two feet from the aperture 

 forms its nesL 



There is a very peculiar and constant feature in the scenery 

 of the woodlands about the summits of the low hills, which has 

 given rise to much speculation amongst us. It is that many of 

 the rounded bosses of syenite rock, which project for a few feet 

 above the level of the swampy land, exhibit on their highest 

 parts isolated mossy tufts, which look at a little distance like 

 small piles of rubbish placed artificially in prominent places as 

 landmarks, or like the marks which mountain climbers are so 

 fond of setting up on rocky pinnacles as records of their feats. 

 The usual shape is that of a c)-linder about eighteen inches high, 

 and ten inches in diameter, with a rounded top ; and it adheres to 

 the rock by a well-defined base of matted fibres. It is composed 

 of a verj' compact moss {Tctraplodon mnioiJcs), which is of a 

 rich green colour on the summit of the tuft when it is in a 

 flourishing condition, and whose decaying remains, converted into 

 a peaty mould entangled in a fibrous network of roots, form the 

 body and base of the tuft. When this moss is in fruit, its long 

 spore-bearing stalks, which rise to a height of three inches above 

 its surface, are of a dark-red colour where they emerge from the 

 green surface, this colour gradually changing into a beautiful 

 golden-yellow above, where the spore-cases are supported. It 

 is then an exceedingly pretty object. If one of these tufts be 

 torn away from its rocky foundation, which is \cxy easily done, 

 and is a most tempting work of destruction, a white scar is left 

 on the rock which will catch the eye at the distance of a mile, 

 and which strongly resembles the small white-washed marks 

 set up on the coasts by our survejors for shooting theodolite 

 angles at. Now the question is, why does the moss establish 

 itself in this peculiar position, on the otherwise bare and exposed 

 rock .' It is all the same whether the rock be dome-shaped, as 

 it most commonly is on the low hill-tops, or pyramidal, or wedge- 



