}£ FRUCTIFICATION OF THE CRYPTOGAMI/E. 



arvensis, for they exactly resemble each other : fig. 9 the 

 target carrying the flowers : fig. 10, an interior vi«rw of the 

 same cut through the middle: fig. 11, the pistil and capsule 

 bearing its seed, with 4 stamens attached to it by their fila- 

 ments, one of which is shown still more magnified at fig. 12. 

 I was proceeding to the agarics, but my letter already ap- 

 pears so long, that 1 shall leave these for my next commu- 

 nication, and join to them the lichens, jungermamiiae, and 

 marchantiie. 



I am, sir, 



Your obliged servant, 

 Cowley Cot. AGNES IB BETSON. 



March the 8th, IS 12. 



Supposed 

 males of cer- 

 utia mo&ses. 



P. S. I think it right, however, to add the three males 

 of the mosses, which I have found, dissected, and exposed to 

 very great magnifying powers. See fig. 7, which, like a 

 number of others, proved merely a collection of leaves : 

 fig. 8, which showed a sort of pistil in the middle concealed 

 and covered by the stamen : and figs. 5 and 6, which ap- 

 peared the male of a polytrichum, but were certainly a 

 complete flower with both stamen and pistil,, The per- 

 fection and exactness of Mr. Sowerby's drawings no one 

 would venture to contradict, and I mean not in any manner 

 to do so, 1 have too many opportunities to admire the per- 

 fect likeness of each object. All that I would wish to sug'- 

 gest is, that the plants taken for males in the mosses are 

 plant9 of the same genus, and having both male and female, 

 which by dissection may be found. To prove this, there 

 are many arguments, most strong and powerful. That na- 

 ture should have formed all this beautiful apparatus for 

 nothing ; that these exact and regular fringes, thus ex- 

 quisitely formed, should be made to bend over the seed ves- 

 sel at a certain time, and rub out a powder : that the veil 

 should remain, without any reason, a stipulated time, then 

 quit it, for as little apparent cause ; is not like her general 

 arrangements. But, on the contrary, that nature should 

 have placed all this spiral wire in the fringes, that its mo- 

 tion, might rub out the pollen from the teeth : that the veil 

 should remain on, to keep the 1 -males from moving, till the 



seed 



