( J. excisa.J 
BRITISH JUNGERMANNHE. 
Calyx (f. f. 3. 7) nearly a line long and three-tenths of a line in diameter, oblong, 
cylindrical at the base, above longitudinally plicate; the mouth scarcely at all 
contracted. Color a very pale whitish green, diaphanous and scariose at the 
extremity: near the middle it is frequently marked with a faint purple ring, which 
sometimes, and more especially in alpine regions, is seen to tinge nearly the whole 
of the calyx. 
Calyptra (f. 10) ovate, pellucid, whitish, reticulated; style short. A few linear- 
lanceolate sterile pistilla surround the germen (f. f. 8. 9). 
Peduncle a line or a line and a half long, white, succulent, cellulose, terminated by 
the ovato-subrotund, deep brown 
Capsule, which divides into four equal ovate valves. 
Seeds and spiral filaments red brown, the former exactly spherical, the latter composed 
of a double helix. 
In the var. (3. (f. 11, 12) the leaves are almost constantly erect, more crowded, longitudinally 
undulated and plicate, with the segments of unequal size, curled and distorted. 
J. excisa, which was first noticed by our excellent cryptogamist, Mr. Dickson, seems to 
be by no means of rare occurrence in this countiy, and during the season of fructification is 
rendered more conspicuous by the large diaphanous calyx than by the foliage. The purple 
tinge is most frequent in exposed situations, but is often altogether wanting. The form and 
size of the calyx (in proportion to that of the plant itself), afford the most striking marks 
of distinction between this and small specimens of J. ventricosa-, for, in the leaves, I am 
unable to point out any marks of separation. From J. incisa, indeed, with which it accords in 
size and general habit, the shape of the leaves will furnish a sufficient difference, although 
Hoffmann, in his Flora Germanica, seems to have confounded the two : at least he applies 
to the stems of this species the words “ apice incrassato” , and in another place he describes 
them as “ subcompressce ”, peculiarities which are remarkable in J. incisa, but, not that I have 
ever observed, in the present plant. Roth has, with a mark of interrogation, quoted Hoff- 
mann’s synonym to his J. byssacea, than which no two plants can be more unlike. The 
same author appears to have united with his J. globulifera not only Mr. Dickson’s J. ven- 
tricosa, and Sehmidel's J. exsecta, but, judging from some part of his description, the present 
is also included in the number. His character of the calyx, which, however, has not appeared 
to me, in any part of it, to be constantly obsoletely triangular, in other respects so well 
accords with this species, that I shall transcribe his words. “ Calyx pallide viridis, plicatus, 
obsolete triangulus, ex oblongo ovatus, ultra lineam, fere sesquilineam longus, apice trun- 
catus, albidus, membranaceus, laciniatus, primo intuitu in caespite sessilis, tamen semper 
in cauliculis centralibus terminalis, quorum longitudinem non raro superat. ” 
REFERENCES 
