46 
NEW AURANGEMENT OF 
Drs Hooker and Taylor have said (Muscologia Bri^ 
tannica), " A delicate horizontal annular membrane may 
be seen to arise within the mouth of the capsule of some 
species, when examined in a fresh state, as in G. microsfO" 
mum^ G. Jhsciculare, G. truncatulum^ and, above all, in 
G. GriffitManum, in which, not unfrequently, this mem- 
brane is entire." And afterwards, " The membrane stretch- 
ing across the mouth of the capsule is only to be seen in 
fresh specimens." Should this membrane in the latter moss 
be found hereafter to arise from the stoma (which, indeed, 
we very much doubt, but which, if it were the case, would 
bring this extraordinary plant under Brown's character of 
Hymenostomwn), and not to be a mere cover to the spo- 
rular sac, it would lead to the formation of a new genus. 
ScHWiEGRiCHEN, indeed, in his Second Supplement lo 
Hedwig's Species Muscorum, has ventured to constitute 
of it a genus from such dried specimens^ as in which he 
confesses he never saw the character : he has called it (Edi- 
podium^ and has separated it from Gymnostomum^ because 
it has " peristomium nullum aut exigua membranula indi- 
visa." Now, every moss possesses this " membranula indi- 
visa," arising from the lining of the theca ; but in all the 
species of Gymnostomum^ it is peculiarly evident at some 
particular stage. 
In our description of the fructification, we have noticed 
the columella, which, in some few species, is of a most re- 
markable form. Dr Hooker has delineated a curious ex- 
ample in G. Xantliocarpum, and we have added that of 
G, pyriforme in one of the plates accompanying this paper. 
In the latter, if a specimen be taken before the fructification 
be quite mature, and the operculum with the opercular 
membrane be forcibly, but carefully detached, we perceive 
a membranaceous expansion, which, if the sporules be re- 
moved, resembles an inverted cone, the base or superior 
