

[Extracted from the Linnean Society's Journal. — Botany, 

 vol. viii.] 



CONTKIBUTIONS 



TO THE 



CRYPTOGAMIC FLORA OF THE ATLANTIC 

 ISLANDS. 



BY 

 WILLIAM MITTEN, A.L.S. 



L 



[Plates I. & II.] 



The Moss-Flora of the Azores, the Canaries, and Madeira, so far 

 as it is possible to judge from the small collection from the Azores 

 given by Mr. H. C. Watson, the enumeration of those from the 

 Canaries by Dr. Montague in Webb and Berthelot's 'Hist, des lies 

 Canaries,' and the collections brought home year by year by Mr. 

 J. Y. Johnson on his return from his winter residence in Madeira, 

 would appear, to be very nearly identical. Nearly all the species 

 enumerated from the Canaries have already been detected in 

 Madeira ; but, even when allowance is made for the position of the 

 Flora as belonging to the Mediterranean region, there still remain 

 a number of species attributed to that Flora which ought to occur 

 in Madeira. Besides the presence of a few species so far as yet 

 known peculiar to the Atlantic Islands, as Astrodontium Canariense 

 and Neckera intermedia, Brid., their Flora contains some other 

 species which, although hitherto known to occur in very few 

 places in Europe, may be expected to be found on the south or 

 western coasts of the British Islands. That this supposition is 

 not unreasonable is proved by the finding of Myurium Hebri- 

 darum, Schimp., a moss common to the x\.zores and Madeira, in the 

 Hebrides. Amongst the specimens obtained by Mr. Johnson in 

 Madeira are three remarkable species, supposed, in the accom- 

 panying descriptions, to belong to the Leskeoid mosses ; of these 



B 



