—72- 
notes ON NORTH AMERICAN SPHAGNUM. I 
By a. LeROY ANDREWS, Ph. D. 
Descriptions of North American species of Sphagnum drawn up for 
the “North American Flora" call for a number of explanatory details 
beyond the scope of that work, and it is my purpose to embody such 
details in a series of notes, combining them with various suggestions 
which I trust may be of service to American bryologists in the study 
of the genus. That any revision of the genus must resolve itself very 
largely into a criticism of Warnstorf's views is so inevitable that I 
trust the fact will account for my frequent mention of that eminent 
bryologist’s name. 
I would at the outset expressly say that it is with the greatest per- 
sonal regard for Herr Warnstorf and admiring recognition of his ser- 
vices to sphagnology that I find myself obliged to dissent from a 
good many of his published opinions. 
I am indebted to the kindness of so many persons for material and 
for other favors that it is impossible to mention all here, but I shall 
have occasion to allude to many in the course of the notes. I am 
especially grateful to the directors of the New York Botanical Garden 
for a two months’ fellowship in the summer of 1909, giving me access 
to the library and collections of the Museum, and to Mrs. Britton for 
her constant kindness and cooperation. 
I. THE GROUPS 
The first to attempt a division of the genus into subgenera was Lind- 
berg, who in his invaluable monograph ^ proposed these subgenera 1. 
Eusphagnum, containing nearly all the species, 2. Isodadus, with S. 
macrophyllum and its synonym, 5. cribrosum, and 3. Hemitheca, with 
S. Pylaesii and S. cyclophyllum? The last two subgenera, separated in 
the one case by the lack of fibrils in the hyaline leaf cells, in the other 
by the form and texture of the capsule, have not maintained them- 
selves, as the relationship of S. Pylaesii to S. subsecundum has long 
been recognized. S. cyclophyllum is perhaps not even specifically dis- 
tinct from the same, and it may be added that Sphagnum macrophyllum 
appears also to find its nearest relative in this species. 
A division of definitely permanent value was first established by 
Russow, who recognized a division into two groups^ : I Inophloea, 
L Europas och Nord Amerikas Hvitmossor, Helsingfors, 1882. 
2. The subgeneric names appear, accredited to I.indberg as sections, in Braith- 
waite’s “Sphagnaceae of Europe and North America” 1880, while Ifiocladus 
(as a genus was proposed by Lindberg as early as 1862 (Ofvers. Kongl. Vet. 
Akad. Forh. 19 : 133). 
3. Zur Anatomie der Torfmoose, Dorpat, 1887, p. 27 f. 
