OF PACIFIC COAST MOSSES. 



MUSCT. 



SPHAGNEJE. 



SPHAGNUM, Dill. 



1 . S. acutifolium, Ehrh. 



Hab. Sierra Nevada ; Upper Tuolumne Canon ; foot of Mt. Dana, 8,000 to 

 9,000 feet, Bol. 



2. S. fimbriatum, Wills. 



Hab. by a brook, at about 11,000 feet on Mt. Brewer, Brew. 



3. S. rigidum, Schp. 



II ab. Yosemite Valley, hillsides, in the spray of the Vernal Falls, Bol. 



Var. B. compactum, Schp. 



Hab. rivulets, foot of Mt. Dana, Bol. 



4. S. squarrulosum, Lsqx Ms. 

 S. squarrosum, var. B. Schp. 



Hab. head of William Lake, near Lassen's Peak, about 5,000 ft., Brew. 



The first Sphagnum found in California. On this species Prof. Brewer re- 

 marks : "It forms a large bog, and is the only Sphagnum I have yet seen in the State 

 "in more than 13,000 miles of peregrinations." 



The true value of this species is still uncertain. In his remarkable Mtmaire 

 pour servir A I'histoire des Sphaignes, (1857) W. P. Schimper mentions it as possibly a 

 small marked form of S. squarrosum, Pers., and in his Synopsis Muscorum Europeorum, 

 (1860) he joins it to this last species as var. B. The far different facies, long, slender 

 branches, similar to those of some forms of Sphagnum cuspidatum, Ehrh.; the longer, 

 narrower leaves, also indicate a specific difference. By details of analysis, S. squarru- 

 losum shows indeed in the cross-sections of the leaves the same kind of reticulation as S. 

 squarrosum, viz: large, round, primary cells with intermediate, elongated, narrow oval 

 ones. But this is the only affinity; and even the cells are narrower in S. squarrulosum, 

 and accordingly the leaves are proportionally thinner. The nearest relative to this 

 still uncertain species is S. rigidum, Schp. One of its varieties, from the Racoon Mts. 

 of Alabama, with branch leaves contracted above the middle and the point reflexcd, is 



(3) 



