NOTES ON SOME ORIENTAL ONOSMAS 
283 
species mixta, nostra nomine O. 'pallidum Boiss. salutandum esset.” 
This leads to the inquiry whether O. pallidum Boiss. must not give 
way to one of there earlier names— O. montanum Sibth., O. rigidum 
Ledeb., or O. Aucherianum DC. Taking these in order: 
(1) O. montanum ; although the unique specimen is identical 
with typical pallidum from Smyrna, the name must be abandoned 
altogether, for Smith’s diagnosis in FI. Gr. Prodr. is insufficient to 
distinguish it from sundry other Onosmas ; the synonyms cited are 
altogether wrong, belonging to a totally different Italian species, 
which does not occur in Greece or in Anatolia, and the alleged 
habitat—Crete and Peloponnesus—is as false for the specimen as for 
the synonyms. O. montanum should therefore be rejected as “ nomen 
conf usissimum. ” 
(2) O. rigidum DeCandolle, Prodr. x. p. 60 (1846), referred to 
O. rigidum Ledeb., the already mentioned plant from the Bithynian 
Olympus, distributed by Aucher-Eloy under No. 2308, on which 
Boissier, Diagn. loc. cit ., remarks “ O. rigida DC. Prodr. est nostra 
species” (sc. O. pallidum “ipsissima, sed O. rigida Ledeb. ex Tauria 
differ!.” As this seems really to be so, O. pallidum must not be 
called O. rigidum. 
(3) O. Aucherianum DC. loc. cit., on the other hand, also from 
Olympus, holds the field. Boisser’s admission in Diagn. loc. cit. is 
conclusive : “ O. scaberrimum Boiss. et Heldr. in pi. Anat. 1846 ” 
(where it is nomen nudum) “ est ipsissima O. Aucheriana DC. Prodr. 
quam quoque ad 0. pallida7n ut formam proceriorem seaberrimam 
refero.” 
According to the rules then O. Aucherianum DC. (1846) cuts 
out O. pallidum Boiss. (1849). 
A NEW VARIETY OF ORTHOTILECIUM INTRICATUM. 
By H. N. Dixon, M.A., F.L.S. 
A little moss from the Yoredale Limestone of West Yorkshire 
has o-iven rise to much trouble. It has been variously referred to 
Orthothecium intricatum, Pylaisia polyantha , PLypnum cupressi- 
forme var. resupinatum , and PLypnum incurralum. The entire 
absence of any defined alar cells seems to preclude the two last, while 
Pylaisia is ruled out by the habitat and by the entire sterility of the 
plants, P. polyantha being autoicous and nearly always abundantly 
fruiting (as is also the case with II. incurvatum), with the alar cells; 
more or less clearly differentiated. There can be little doubt that the 
plant is a form of Orthothecium intricatum, forming very dense, 
somewhat glossy tufts, the stems exceedingly slender, the leaves 
minute, ovate-lanceolate, and very shortly acuminate, sometimes- 
indeed little more than acute ; the cells all very short and compara¬ 
tively wide, linear-rhomboid, very uniform throughout the leaf, the- 
apical ones a little narrower, and the basal rather wider, without any 
differentiation in the alar region. The leaves are quite nerveless. 
The general colour of the tufts is blackish below, deep dull green 
above, often with a slight reddish tinge, which is one of the clear 
indications that it belongs to the Orthothecium. 
