Lees : Mosses of the Wetherby District. 



183 



[Thuidium abietinum, L. Mr. Wesley discovered this, sparingly, 

 in an old limestone quarry at Ingbarrow and Kirk Deighton ; 

 since I came to reside at Wethe]'by I have noticed it in several 

 new localities, in one of which — Jackdaw Crag, near Sutton — it 

 is strange it was not noticed long ago, seeing that that quarry, 

 and the district about, were well worked by Spruce, Ibbotson, 

 and others. This is assuming, of course, that it was there then, 

 the contrary hypothesis opening up a wide and interesting 

 inquiry. I, myself, am disposed to believe it may well have 

 originated since, as the locality has altered. We know it is the 

 rule for ground freshly broken up, or turned over, to yield relays 

 of vegetation. Take a 'railway cutting, for example, and we 

 know that the first year or two its surface is appropriated by 

 coarse annuals, these gradually disappearing and another florula 

 taking their place, these again gradually giving way to a third 

 type of perennials. Why not so with an old quarry ? York 

 Minster was partly built of stone quarried from Jackdaw Crag, 

 and most certainly for the first few years subsequent to its being 

 let alone it is not a matter for doubt that the broken ground 

 would yield orchids, gentians, and the usual plants of a recent 

 lime-quarry. Year by year these would grow scarcer, and the 

 rocks slowly become moss-clothed ; at first Hypnum serpens, 

 lutescens, and chrysophyllum, with other coarse vigorous species, 

 prevailing ; and then others, and, finally, yet others. Now, in 

 this quarry, on the weathered and moss-grown rock-faces we 

 have several species of a decidedly montane type, and yet I can 

 find records of none of these latter in the floras of 1840, 1854, 

 and only of one in that of 1862. I may perhaps be pardoned 

 prolonging this digression by proceeding to give illustrations : 

 Antennaria dioica, two GoUemas, Frullania Tamarisci, Thuidium 

 abietinum, Cylindrothecium concinnum, Tortula tortuosa, Ncclzera 

 crispa, Cladonia rangiferina, and — best example of all — the mon- 

 tane lichen Endocarpon miniatum may to-day be found occurring 

 there. The Endocarpon occurs nowhere nearer than Malham 

 Cove, and being a slow grower, it must have taken well-nigh a 

 century to clothe the face of the bare vertical rocks in the 

 abundant way it does now.] 

 9, Brachythecium albicans, Neck. Jackson's quarry, Kirk Deighton, 



and on broken ground in lane west of Lund Wood, near Eigton 



Bank top. 



0. Eurynchium crass oner vium, Tayl. On wet stones by weir at 

 Thorp-arch. 



