166 
strongly arcuate and horizontal; -operculum conic-apiculate ; 
annulus very narrow and inconspicuous, often remaining attached 
to the operculum ; teeth of peristome red-brown below ; segments 
nearly as long as the teeth; cilia 2, well developed, nodose 
or subappendiculate; spores nearly smooth, 155, maturing 
in autumn or early winter. 
Type locality European. 
On earth, stones, roots and trunks of trees, and rotting wood 
in woods and moist shady places. Eastern Canada and northern 
and eastern United States; rarely found west of Minnesota and 
Nebraska ; south to North Carolina; Montana (Dr. F. W. Ander- 
son, R. S. Williams); Idaho (Leiberg); Green Lake and Fraser 
River (Macoun). Not rare. 
ILLUsTRATIONS.—Br. & Sch. l. c.; Lesq. & James, Mosses 
of North America. f/. 5; Husnot, Musc. Gall. ^. 95; Rab. 
Krypt. Fl. 4°, f. 364. 
ExsiccATi.—Sull. and Lesq. Musc. Bor. Am. (Ed. 1) 328, 
(Ed. 2) 487; Austin, Musc. Appal. 312 and 313; Macoun, Can. 
Musc. 283, 438 (Hypuum acutum). 
Distinguished from B. oxycladon, which it closely resembles, by 
being monoicous ; by the shorter and more curved capsules and 
the more distant and open leaves, having a looser basal areolation ; 
branch leaves also more slender pointed. The capsules are very 
variable in length, sometimes almost exactly resembling those of 
B. oxycladon. An extremely variable species as at present under- 
stood 
Authentic specimens of P. /aevisetum Kindb. from the type lo- 
cality have been examined and no characters could be found to 
differentiate it from B. salebrosum. 
A great variation in the appearance of the dried specimens ap- 
pear to be due to the conditions of drying. Herbarium specimens 
with the leaves widely spreading and somewhat complanate, upon 
being wet and dried again took on the appearance that is charac- 
teristic of the species, the branches becoming terete-foliate and the 
' leaves much more closely appressed. 
1a. BRACHYTHECIUM SALEBROSUM FLACCIDUM Br. & Sch. Bryol. 
Eur. fasc. 52—54. pl. $50. 1853. 
.. Gametophyte in wide loose dark green mats; stem and branches _ 
slender ; branch leaves distant, spreading, more or less complanate, 
