FRUCTIFICATION OF THE CRYPTOGAMS. <J 



Constantly lead up to the capsule, in which the)' form stripes. 

 That which used to be called the male is a cryptogamian 

 plant, found in all these diminutive vegetables, and taken • 

 generally for the stamen of the mosses, filices, lichens, and 

 others : for, as it grows always, and has the appearance of 

 powder, the mistake was very natural to those who knew no 

 law, by which a parasite plsnt could be distinguished from 

 the identical plant on examination. Fig. 9 is the capsule ; 

 I, its interior: fig. 10, is a more highly magnified view of 

 the outer fringe, K, and the inner fringe, L : figs. ] 1 and 

 12 are the pitcher-shaped leaves. Most mosses, when they 

 first shoot, require much water ; and there being a quantity 

 of spiral "wire in the leaves, they easily draw into this shape, 

 and for some time retain water in each leaf by the contrac- 

 tion the moisture occasions. That it is the spiral wire, that 

 passes up the capsule in the wood vessels, is plainly shown 

 in the stripe that accompanies this part, and is more 

 strongly evinced in the figure of the tortula subulata. 

 When the upper case stops some way below the seed vessel, 

 the stripe leaves the outer case and runs up the under, in 

 the shape of a corkscrew, to form bffth fringes. See 

 Sowerby's admirable print, which is very exact. Vol. 16, 

 p. 1107. Both fringes move, and both must concur in the 

 office of the male, since the spiral is worked to and fro from 

 the outward to the inner ves-el repeatedly; and is seen in 

 the microscope to contract and dilate at the bottom of the 

 capsule, as I have marked at N N, fig. 9. In the poly- 

 trichia, that which is supposed to be the male plant has cer- 

 tainly not only stamens, but a pistil, and is of itself a com- 

 pletely distinct plant ; the middle of which opens, and shows 

 the pointal, while the teeth around unclose at the edges, and 

 discover the pollen. In all that I am acquainted with this-is 

 the case, but I know only four ; it is not often I could find 

 the plant called the male, and then they were perfectly di- 

 vided, having their own stem and root. 



As to the mosses that have no apparent fringes, there may Seme mosses 



be some having the male flower in a different plant : but. if may have the 

 t iiij^ l.ti p . ma,e in a dif - 



I may be allowed to say what I have often experienced in ferent plant. 



many cases, when the fringes are not to be found in the 



usual place, I seek it in the lid or veil, where I seldom miss , 



finding 



