86 



The Naturalist. 



consigned to the common bag (carrii d by West, in which fact I rejoiced, 

 as it grew very heavy before we'd done ! ) which held our gatherings. It 

 was not recognised until I sent Mr. Boswell a sample of several of the 

 things we had found. With regard to the aspect of the slope where 

 found, it is a curious coincidence — unknown to me until the Rev. J. 

 Fergusson remarked upon it — that Prof. Barker's Ben More moss, 

 gathered seven years ago, was also found on the north-eastern side of the 

 mountain, the aspect upon which spores blown from Iceland or Norway 

 would be most likely to be deposited. Or, regarding this more as a relic 

 of a time when an alpine flora covered the land, the assertion might be 

 ventured on that a north-eastern slope would have the bleakest aspect, 

 and that on such a slope boreal types would longest survive. 



It is to be regretted that such a limited quantity was gathered by Mr. 

 West and myself on Whernside, as if the moss is very local (as on Ben 

 More) it may be no easy_matter to find the precise spot again. The 

 faciei of the moss, when growing, was not appreciably difi'erent from A. 

 palmtre, the only contrast being that the colour of the tuft, or young 

 barren shoot, was of a paler, yellower green, and the leaves more imbri- 

 cated, more closely overlying one another, than is generally the case in 

 the common species. The moss is one I had never before seen, and 

 until Mr. Boswell recognised it neither he nor I knew that it was a 

 British plant at all. I have never received, or even seen, continental 

 specimens, and should imagine the species to be almost unrepresented in 

 English herbaria. Mr. West and myself, if all go well, will certainly 

 make an effort to re-gather it in quantity in the spring. I had not 

 intended to record its discovery at all until we had so re-gathered it ; 

 this present record is forced upon me by others threatening to publish 

 the facts if I do not. 



III. Fontinalis gracilis, Lindb. (F. minor, Wahlenberg.) This moss, 

 not previously known as British, was detected at Malham Cove in 1876, 

 by Prof. Barker, of Owen's College — a most acute observer, as Mr. 

 Fergusson informs me. I have received a specimen. When not in 

 fruit I do not wonder it should have been hitherto overlooked, since in 

 fades it bears a considerable resemblance to Hypmm cordijoliiim when 

 growing in water, or to H.Jiuitans. I do not mean that examination 

 with a lens will not instantly reveal the difference, for it will ; but to the 

 naked eye the similarity is so great, that I am sure if I had chanced to 

 find it growing by the Aire at Malham Cove, when last there, unknowing 

 that Fontinalis gracilis grew there. I should have said in my mind, 

 " Hypmim fiuitaiis^'' and passed on. Of course to so pass mosses is a 

 dangerous thing, a bad habit ; and yet how often it is done, and espe- 



