— g— 
A SECOND STATION FOR FISSIDENS CLOSTERI. 
Louise Holmes Handy. 
September 27, 1908, while getting specimens of Fissidens minutulus in 
Tiverton, Rhode Island, near the Massachusetts line, I saw on the opposite 
bank of the brook a large flat stone covered with a purplish brown pro- 
tonema and many straw colored specks that proved to be a tiny moss with 
leaves, seta and capsule. It was impossible to take them from the stone in 
perfect condition but two small stones with the moss I took home. 
Under the microscope it was very beautiful ; light green leaves, straw col- 
ored seta and capsule with red peristome; the whole plant, as Barnes gives 
it, less than 1 mm. high. It was found in a brook when the water was low 
but the banks were very damp and covered with dense shade. We called it 
Fissidens Closteri Aust. , and were very glad when Dr. Grout confirmed the 
determination and said that our locality was the second on record. 
Sullivant describes and figures it in leones Muse. Suppl. p. 44, t. 29. If 
others have found it they have not reported it, but its small size and fruiting 
in September may account for its being overlooked. The specimens were in 
all stages, some having calyptra, others with all the spores gone and the 
leaves turning brown. Fall River, Mass. 
A PLEA AGAINST ABBREVIATIONS. 
Some American writers and publishers of exsiccati have in recent years 
fallen unconsciously into the habit of using geographical abbreviations. If ‘ 
this has not offended, it has certainly caused much annoyance to our foreign 
confreres, and a plea for reform in this practice comes trom Dr. Emilio 
Levier, the very genial German bryologist resident in Florence, Italy. He 
writes in part: 
“I am often seriously embarrassed to guess at the meaning of the 
abbreviations, which of course are easy enough for you in America, but which 
here (Europe) by no means belong to the instruction in elementary branches, 
and which I therefore am obliged to dig out laboriously from atlas and ency- 
clopaedia. I take at random the label of your No. 70b, Philonotis fontana. 
This reads ; “Selkirk Mts., near Armstrong, B. C.” Pray what does this 
B. C. stands for ? In my large atlas I find only that the Selkirks belong to 
Manitoba , which can by no possibility be abbreviated to B. C. And of Arm- 
strong, not a trace in Manitoba! These abbreviations and hieroglyphics in 
labels, as I said before, are a despair to me. 
“ It seems to me therefore that it would be an extraordinary blessing to 
all of us not Americans, if you, Dr. Grout and all others, would form the 
resolution in the future to entirely avoid such unintelligable abbreviations 
on labels and other publications, and to write out in full all names of states 
and geographical data.” 
Dr. Levier then gives another illustration from Dr. Grout’s exsiccati, No. 
160, Plagiothecium groutii , Hempstead, L. I To his joy our correspond- 
ent found by accident that L. I. stands for Long Island; but he insists that 
of one hundred or even one thousand educated Europeans not one would at 
sight know what L. I. stands for. 
