136 



The Naturalist. 



fruit) being one of the species. Mr, Stanley showed two slides of the 

 recently discovered hepatics : Mr. Pearson, specimens of an hepatic new 

 to the Manchester flora — Diplopliyllum minutum, Dmrt., gathered by 

 Mr. G. A. Holt lately on Kinder Scout ; also specimens of the rare Lio- 

 chlcena lanceolata and Harpanthus scutatus, collected in Eskdale by Mr. 

 M. B. Slater, and Sphcerocarpiis terrestris from Herefordshire, collected by 

 Mr. B. M. Watkins. Capt. Cunliffe having recently visited the neighbour- 

 hood of Barmouth (a veritable moss paradise in winter time), brought 

 home a considerable number of mosses in fruit, amongst them the. rare 

 Campylostelium saxicola, Hypnum Schreheri, Hylocomium hrevirostrum, 

 and the rarely fruiting Didymodon cylmdricns ; some of these were gener- 

 ously distributedby Mr. Cunliffe. With reference to the specimens of Didy- 

 modon exhibited, Mr. Cash read a short communication on its discovery 

 and detection. He stated that the species was described as new by Hooker 

 and Taylor in the Muscologia Britannica," (ed. 2, 1827), under the name 

 of Weissia tennirodris, the figure (for which, as well as the description. Dr. 

 Taylor was alone responsible) was unfortunately bad, and contemporary 

 bryologists disputed the right of W. tenuirostris to be considered a good 

 species. Hooker himself did not believe in it. He was of opinion that the 

 figure of the capsule, as it appears in- the Muscologia," was drawn from 

 Weissia curvirostra, Brid., Didymodon ruhellus, Roth. : whilst Wilson 

 imagined that Dr. Taylor had picked up some form of Tortula tortuosa. Dr. 

 Taylor had found the moss at the foot of the Campsie hills, near Glasgow, 

 during an excursion with Hooker and Greville, in or about the year 1826. 

 When they came to examine their gatherings, this alone struck Dr. Taylor 

 as something " rare "; the others, however, were sceptical, and " did their 

 utmost to demolish the pretensions of the plant to be considered distinct." 

 The controversy (or " wrangle," as the Doctor himself called it, in 

 writing to Wilson) was both long and warm. Fourteen years or more 

 after its discovery at Campsie, this moss was the subject of a long 

 correspondence between Taylor and Wilson. Specimens found by the 

 latter at Dolgelly, and by Dr. Taylor near Dunkerron, in Ireland, where 

 he then lived, proved it to be specifically distinct. The controversy 

 turned chiefly upon generic characters. Dr. Taylor, whilst confessing 

 that his figure of the peristome in the '^Muscologia Britannica" was 

 "inapt," still claimed it as a fVeissia. Mr. Wilson, on the other hand, 

 insisted on its being referred to Didymodon, and in support of his conten- 

 tion sent Dr. Taylor dissections of his own Irish specimens, which, if they 

 did not convince, threw the Doctor into such difficulties and such per- 

 plexity that he was not in a fit state for forming any decision. He 

 added, in the letter from which we quote, — " It is a bewildering theme, 

 which I had rather relinquish for the present." Mr. Wilson's view 

 triumphed. The moss was by all leading muscologists accepted as a 

 species of Didymodon, and it is now universally known, not by the 

 name bestowed by Dr. Taylor, but by that of Bruch and Schimper — 

 Didymodon cylindricns.—TB.os. Rogers, Hon. Sec, 



