26 [ 2097 ]
LICHEN conspersus.
Greenish Chesnut-shielded Lichen.
CRYPTOGAMIA Alga.
G en. Char. Male, scattered warts.
Female, smooth shields or tubercles, in which the
seeds are imbedded.
Spec. Char. Imbricated, radiated, membranous, pale
glaucous green, besprinkled with blackish points;
granulated in the centre; brown with black fibres
beneath ; its segments lobed and sinuated, with dilated,
rounded extremities. Shields towards the
centre, chesnut, with an inflexed border like the
leaf.
$yn. Lichen conspersus. Ach. Prod. 1 1 8 .
L. centrifugus. Huds. 5 3 0 . W ith . v. 4. 3 2 . Hull.
2 9 4 . L ig h tf. 8 1 4 .
Lichenoides imbricatum viridans, scutellis badiis. Dill.
Muse. 180. t. 2 4 . ƒ 7 5 .
Parmelia conspersa. Ach. Meth. 2 0 5 . Winch Guide,
v. 2 . 5 6 .
T h IS very handsome Lichen grotvs on stones and rocks in
the north, making a very fine appearance in wet weather, as
we saw it about Bield and Moffat in the south of Scotland,
where we gathered these specimens in 1782. They have
suffered no alteration since, but on being at any time moistened,
resume their original hue, which is only rather less green and
vivid when dry.
The above characters sufficiently describe the species. It
ranges near our sinuosus, t. 2050, but belongs to a- section
with broader segments, containing scorteus, t. 2065, cape-
ratus, t. 654, &c. The chesnut disk of the shields at length
falls out, leaving its basis of the colour of the leaf. We
have found a variety in Italy, whose under side is much paler,
approaching, in that respect, the true Linnaean centrifugus;
but the latter is essentially distinguishable by its narrow
linear paler segments, almost white (with blackish fibres)
beneath, and, as Professor Afzelius informs us, spreads into
circles many feet in extent, whose centre decays and disappears
to within a hand’s-breadth of the edge. Our whole plant is never
above 6 inches wide, and but slightly decays in the middle.
Dillenius first confounded them.