112 HANDY BOOK OF 
A variety, with trailing sterns and brownish green leaves, 
somewhat open, with branched shoots, floating on the water, 
or mantling stone and pebbles, round which some prattling 
stream forms eddies of white foam, may be readily dis- 
tinguished by short and blackish fruit -stalks, and straight, 
oblong, dark green capsules. This variety is not uncommon 
in rivulets that water the moors of the Peak of Derbyshire 
and in the racing torrents near Llanbcrris, Carnarvonshire. 
Mr. Griffith gathered a fine specimen in the first brook after 
crossing Pont Alwen, between Denbigh and Cerrig y 
Druidion. 
The Bryum dcalbatum, or Pale-leaved thread-moss, is a 
somewhat rare moss in England, though not unfrequent 
among Scottish mountains, especially on Ben Lawers. Bo- 
tanists will readily distinguish it, by observing that the 
capsules are roundish, somewhat bent, toothed and fringed, 
and that the leaves are spear-shaped, acute, and expanding. 
Such are its chief characteristics ; and when submitted to a 
microscope, there is much found to admire in this simple, 
rock-adhering moss. Minute leaves, which resemble the 
finest scales, become enlarged, pellucid, finely but obscurely 
serrated, and seem as if covered with network ; the scarcely 
perceptible capsule displays its teeth and fringes, and deli- 
cately formed lid. A pitcher in truth it is, filled with the 
finest seeds, upheld with others of its kind to the genial 
influence of air and light, and when that purpose is accom- 
plished, bending to the earth. 
The Bryum marginatum, or Bordered thread-moss, is 
equally worthy of attention. The shoots are mostly simple, 
the leaves egg spear-shaped, pointed, finely toothed, and 
bordered with a mid-rib and thick red edge, the capsules 
egg cylindrical, with a beaked lid. All this is obvious to 
the unassisted eye, and the yellowish hue of the Bordered 
thread-moss readily distinguishes it ; but when seen through 
a microscope, how greatly is its beauty heightened ! The 
lurid hue of the nerve and margin in each leaf becomes of a 
