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truly attractive bryophytes became familiar to us and, today, each species in its 

 proper place, macroscopically, microscopically, is surely impressed upon our eye 

 and mind, — aesthetic concomitants of the forests which they adorn. 



Is there a moss lover who has not seen and admired the decaying logs of our 

 north woods endearingly spread with the soft feathery mats of Ptilium crista- 

 castrensis — the Knight s Plume — whose color varies from pale primrose green to 

 wonderfully delicate tints of fawn and russet? Many of us recall great boulders 

 in the mountain woods, upholstered with abundant mats of the exquisite Hylo- 

 comium proliferum gracefully curved and dissected like the fronds of tiny ferns — 

 plumes to deck the sylvan fairies! I have seen beds of that before-mentioned 

 Hypnum Schreberi near Profile House with single plants over a foot in length. 

 Then, those pale green or yellow cushions of Drepanocladus uncinatus, with 

 slender hooked and plicate leaves- — how memory of them bears us back to the 

 fairest of woodsy scenes among our beloved White Mountains, Adirondacks, and 

 Catskills! And we can personally picture a lovely dell near Franconia, New 

 Hampshire — we called it the Dell of the Nine Muses, because a group of nine 

 graceful white birch trees grew beside it — where Rhyiidtadelphus triquetrus has 

 never appeared in deeper, softer green luxuriance, and there the fairies of a cer- 

 tainty dance on Midsummer Eve! 



These are some of the larger and more conspicuous of our hypnaceous mosses, 

 but scores of other species abound and, when once known, we wonder why they 

 seemed so difficult to determine. Campylium chrysophyllum, with squarrose 

 leaves, and of a decided golden color, is at home in moist fields, especially where 

 lime is present, and, its tiny brother, Campylium hispidulum, may be looked for 

 on the base of forest trees, where its delicate light green tracery well repays 

 examination under the hand-lens. A frequent companion of the larger Campy- 

 lium is Stereodon arcuaius, usually palish or yellowish green, with clearly secund 

 leaves and with branches decumbent or erect. Stereodon imponens, irregularly- 

 pinnate with curved leaves showing opaque brownish basal cells, is to be found on 

 decaying wood or soil in almost every mountain forest, and, with a more southerly 

 range, is the robust, handsome moss with leaves neatly plaited like braids of 

 hair — Stereodon curvif alius. Perhaps no pleurocarpous moss is commoner in our 

 mountains than Stereodon reptilis, which is covered with just-matured fruit in 

 August, forming close, thin mats on soil, rock, and logs, but, take care that you 

 differentiate it from Amhlystegiella adnata, which is somewhat smaller, closer to 

 the substratum, and microscopically with different leaf cells. 



The Brachythecia, too, present a series of beautiful forms, which are mois- 

 ture-loving. In early spring you will see at the edge of our streams patches of 

 the brightest green imaginable which consist of Bryhma novae-angliae, charac- 

 terized by decurrent leaves with twisted apices and microscopically dense often 

 papillose cells. At this season the banks and rocks are covered with the fresh 

 growth of Brachythecium plumosum with frequent sporophytes of dark brown or 

 even blackish color. I might lead you to perpendicular rocks where the robust 

 tufts of Brachythecium- rutabulum appear in glossy yellow-green profusion and to 

 many a mountain brook filled with Bracliythecium rivularc, the leaves showing 



