THE SPHAGNACE^ OR PEAT-MOSSES OF 





I \ 



one other species, which he named 6". palustre, with a var. ^, and 

 under this he included all the true species of the family. 



EnRiiART clearly defined the genus, and established as species 

 6". cymbifolium, aaiti/olitcm, and cttspidatum, in the Hannoverisches 

 Magazin (1780), and Planta Crypt. Exsicc. (1785). 



Hedwig, in his Fundamenta Muscoruni (1782), characterized 

 the genus, and gave most beautiful figures of the fruit and 

 antheridia, the latter being then made known for the first time. 



B RIDEL described several species in the Muscologia Recentiorum 

 (1797), and in his Mantissa (1819) extends the number to fourteen, 

 six being European. 



ScHWAEGRiCHEN, in Suppl. I. to Hedwig's Species Mtiscoruui^ 

 figures Sph. cuspidattim, compactiim, and squarrostim. 



P. DE Beauvois gives a good natural character of the genus 

 in a paper on Muscology, in Mdmoires de la Societe Linnecnne, Paris, 

 1822, and notices the peculiar areolation of the leaves as serving 

 to distinguish them from all other mosses. 



N. VON Esenbeck and Hornschuch, in the Bryologia Ger- 

 manica, vol. i. (1823), describe nine species of Sphagnum, but 

 two of these are only varieties ; and figures are given of thirteen 

 species and varieties. 



Bridel, in his last work, Bryologia Universa (1826), added 

 the natural characters of the genus to the description he had 

 previously given, and pointed out its distinctness from all others. 



J. Hegetschweiler contributed a paper, Revision des Genus 

 Sphagmint, to the Denkschriften der ScJnveizer Gesells. fur gesam. 

 Naturwiss., Zurich, 1829, in which he looks upon the species of 

 Sphagnum as so variable, that he refers all the forms to a broad- 

 leaved and a narrow-leaved species, just as they were originally 

 placed by Dillenius. 



FiJRNRGiiix, in the Regensburg Botanische Zeitnng for 1833, gave 

 a paper, Verstich einer Lebens- und Formgeschichte der Gattung 

 Sphagnum., but it is only a resume of the work of previous writers. 



C. MuLLER, in his valuable Synopsis Muscorum Frondosorum 

 (1846), formed a tribe Sphagnacece, and gives full descriptions of 

 seventeen species, but speaks of the leaves having mtercelhdar 

 ducts ; he also describes the cells as inanes or repletce, according 

 to the presence o'- absence of spiral threads, and uses this as an 

 important character in the distinction of species, though we now 

 know that really little stress can be laid upon it ; yet that this 



