350 
NOTICES OF BOOKS. 
A Synopsis of British Mosses. By C. P. Hopxmr. Ed. 2. 
pp. vili. 240. Reeve & Co. 1884. 
A seconD edition of this little book speaks well for its popularity 
among students of Bryology, and extends to forty-four pages beyond 
its predecessor. 
The difficulty of describing so extensive and intricate a group 
as that of the Mosses, in a manner sufficiently popular to interest 
cannot be distinguished from t that are common or general. 
The arrangement of the families is different from that in the first 
edition, being founded on that enunciated by Hampe in ‘Das 
Moosbild’ (1871), the main divisions of which—Saccomitria and 
€ notice very few errors in the book, but we may indicate 
that, on p. 48, var. Jimbriatum should be imbricatum ; and on p. 78 
Swartzti should be Schwarzii: p. 75, Dicranum uncinatum has the 
fruit both described and figured in the ‘Moss-flora’; a tribe, Georgi- 
ace, also appears, but we do not find any genus Georgia to 
represent it. 
The number of species described is 576, being thirteen more 
lon; these 
nicus, Coscinodon Patersoni, Bryum Mildeanum, B. 
Muhlenbeckii, B. cyclophyllum, and Hypnum Lorentzianum. 
Should another edition be called for, we trust the talented 
author will see his way to improve it in the direction indicated, 
and thus render it more worthy of its character, as being the best 
handbook on the subject which has yet appeared. R. Bs 
We welcome another part (the 8th) of Dr. Braithwaite’s 
‘ British Moss-flora,’ in which the Tortulacee are begun. It is not 
only worthy of its predecessors, but in some respects seems to us 
even superior to them, the beauty of the plates illustrating 
Ephemerum and Phascum being quite unsurpassed. While wishing, 
