24 BRYOLOGY OF NEW ZEALAND. 
Distribution —Western South America, from Peru to Patagonia; the 
whole Australasian region; and the subantarctic islands of New Zealand. 
illardiert may be looked upon as the type of the group of Austral- 
asian species with very narrow and weak rahi. nerve. Although a 
widely distributed species, and, like most such, no dou mewhat variable, 
I have not found it to be so in any such degree as 8 ee the above 
somewhat formidable synonymy. For the greater part of this we are 
indebted to a number of species chiefly from the pe Prai Sat Continent, 
for the bulk of which, I am compelled to say, there seems not the slightest 
justification. I have examined the types of all C. Miiller’s species cited 
above, both those published in Hedwigia (1897) and those which remain 
unpublis in his herbarium, and in nearly every case have failed to find 
any appreciable departure from the ordinary forms of D. Billardieri.. In 
D. turgidum and D. pelliceum (C. M. ined.) the capsule shows scarcely.any 
trace of struma, but this is not infrequently the case wit tidy 
when gathered in certain stages, even though apparently matur 
have part of the original plant of D. austro-congestum C. M. ca 
Falls, Mossvale, Victoria, 1884, leg. Whitelegge), and I can only see in it a 
slender form of D. Billardieri. C. Miiller describes the cells as SEtoge the 
walls non-porose, but I find them distinctly porose, though somewhat less 
incrassate than is, perhaps, usual in D. Billardieri. There is nothing else 
in his aS aah of either this or D. Baileyanum to oan rel difference 
from D. Billardieri, to which most certainly both must be refer 
In C. Miiller’s herbarium are two specimens labelled e% D. Sullivani 
C. M. n. sp.” Of one, which is the type (Mount William, Victoria, Sullivan, 
1882), I have not seen sufficient material to be able to form a judgment, 
but it is in all probability imseparable from D. fasciatum. The other 
(Victoria, Healesville, prope Melbourne, Fernshaw, 1897) is different, and 
is certamly D. Billardieri. 
The description in Hedwigia of D. orthopyxis suggests no difference 
from D. vert except that the inner perichaetial bract is described 
as “ apice . Taptim acumine subulato serrulato coronata,” and the 
capsules as “ erecta parva cylindrica.” Part of the type specimen was 
3 
examination. Dr. Mildbraed has, however, kindly at my request examined 
he specimen, and has sent me the following note: “ In dem Original von 
Dicranum orthopyxis C. Mill. ist nur eine alte Kapsel i und 
re ist durch das Pressen ganz flach gedriickt! Die Insertion der Seta 
ie Kapsel ist nicht ganz symmetrisch.” It will generally be agreed 
that a single old capsule in a not very good state of preservation affords an 
insufficient basis for the foundation of a new species. ere remains the 
perichaetium. That which I examined, and which, bemg quite young, was 
pied perfect, syst the innermost perichaetial bract with an extremely 
rt point, and certainly did not suggest any difference worth noting 
pi D. Billardieri. C. Miller's description would seem to imply a longer 
point, but the terms used do not necessarily involve this, and, in any case, 
I do not think any great weight need be attributed to it. I have therefore 
no hesitation in considering D. orthopyxis as at most a slight form of 
D. Billardieri. 
1am strongly of opinion that D. angustinerve Mitt. must also be referred 
here. Mitten himself expresses some a Se A as to its distinctness. I 
have received two specimens from his herbarium purporting to be this 
species, one of them from Taranaki, N.Z., leg. Jupp, which was — 
