A RAMBLE UP BURNHOPE. 99 



At a place where the rocks were wet was another very 

 beautiful moss, Fissidens adiantoides, Ifed., also with old fruit 

 stalks still adhering. A struggle for existence was going on 

 between it and a liverwort, but I could not make up my 

 mind which was the aggressor. Certainly the moss had the 

 best of it so far. On the trunk of a tree, projecting over the 

 stream, was a thick curly mass oi Eitrhynchium myosuroidcs, L., 

 a pretty so-called tree-moss, with round incurved branches. 

 Among the grass round the trees was that favourite moss, 

 Hylocomhim triqtietnim, Z,, well known, at least in a dried 

 state, and the beautiful Thuidhim tai/iari'scinum, lied., and a 

 number of other pleurocarpal, or side-fruited mosses. Besides 

 these, Dicranum scoparium, Hed., was there, in its great silky 

 cushions, with its leaves so gracefully turned to one side, and 

 a Bartramia, I think CEderi, covered with its small round fruit, 

 and the beautiful pale green cushions of Philonites fontana, 

 Brid., in the wet boggy places. 



And then the ferns : — the Common Polypody ( Polypodhnn 

 vulgare, L.) was looking over the tops of the rocky banks ; 

 here and there in fissures and rocky holes was Asplenium 

 viride, Utids., generally not at all common, but here decidedly 

 more frequent than its usually more common relative, A. 

 trichonianes, L., and on the larger ledges, where earth had 

 collected, were numerous fine patches of the Bladder Fern, 

 Cystopieris fragilis, Bernd. 



I could have spent hours in examining and collecting these 

 beautiful forms. But time was passing, and I could only 

 wrap up a few specimens in the butter-paper and pass on up 

 the stream. 



But, hold on ! What are these flies resting on the rocks, at 

 the very edge of the purling stream, or apparently walking up 

 its rippling surface? I knew them in a moment, small as 

 they were, with their shining metallic bodies, to be members 

 of the numerous family of the Dolichopodidae, and probably 

 of a species I did not possess. It is no easy task to catch 

 them without drenching the net, which in their case, however, 

 is not of so much consequence as in others, for they seem to 



