330 BRYOLOGY OF NEW ZEALAND. 
or sche oo Capsule usually inclined and more or less 
asymme 
Key TO GENERA. 
1 ( Cel ls with fine papillae in rows 
(Cells smooth _..... 
mae os Gee oA. Tazithelium 
Laie salibisek saustaat. very concave, with 
2 | — mucronate or _ shortly pilferocus 
LATS SS. Soe 
| Leaves hot distichous, “not very concave ...... 
ma, Cells asi harrow, scarcely enlarged at base or 
pa 122 0G: Ra eae WoLaie ects Weel tt Bn cesar epics rie Gee Ge hare hae Isopterygium 
ki Gate pay alar enlarged, ‘Jax, often decurrent Plagiothecium 
CatTaconium C.M. e Brotherus in En igl. & Prantl, Pflanzenfam.., 
po ii, 1087 (1908).* (C.M. in Flora 1885, p. 425 nomen 
— 
A small and distinct genus, the leaves in their arrangement 
very similar to those of Ort thorrhynchium, but much less glossy, 
and the whole en larger, with quite -different fruit. 
Catagonium politum (H. f. & W.) Dus. in ee of the Princeton 
Univ. Exped. to Patagonia, viii, 117 (1903). 
ee politum H. f. & W. in Lond. Journ. Bot., iii, 
e353 (1844); Fl. N.Z. ii, 114; Handb. N.Z. FL, 82. 
Acrocladium politum Jaeg. Adumbr. i, 509. 
A highly variable plant in habit and size, sometimes in dense 
patches, sometimes lax and straggling, the branches sometimes very 
narrow and Sidasionalle flagelliform, but always showing some of 
the ie Phe flattened, distichous fronds; the leaves may be distant and 
spreading, or closely equitant and | almost erect;- the apex may 
entire; ’ the cells extremely narrow. The fruit is rare, the se eta 
1-2 em. high, capsule suberect and almost symme trie, or inclined and 
slightly curved, with a tapering neck; lid beaked, about half as long 
as the capsule. 
t is a frequent, but not abundant species. 
It appears to be extremely doubtful whether C. politum and C. 
mucronatum (C.M.) are not identical with C. Auberti (Schwaegr. ) 
but both the ‘New Zealand ape and the S Afri riean C. ahehoudion 
exhibit such a wide range of forms he above respects that I 
am confident that they are unreliable as specific characters, and that 
Dog ae es nein Sara ob ae kate er Rian eens SURO ae oe 
Nercricncns is usually cited as of C. Mueller, but that author, so 
far as I can ver, never Aang, oes it as a genus, either with a descrip- 
tion or the citation of included species 
