D I C R A N U M flagellare.
Slender-hr (inched Fork-moss.
CRYPT0GAM1A Musci.
G e n . Ch a r . Caps, oblong. Fringe o f 16 flat, cloven
teeth, a little inflexed.
Spec. Ch a r . Stem branched, fibrous. Leaves bristle,
shaped, dilated at the base, with a pellucid broadish
n e r v e a l l curved to one side. Capsule erect, cy.
lindrical, somewhat furrowed.
Sy n . Dicranum flagellare. Hedrv. Sp. M u s e. 130.
Crypt, v . 3. 1 . t. 1 . Sm. FI. B r it. 1206. Turn.
M u s e. H ib . 61.
Bryum flagellare. D ic k s . Cryp t, fa s c . 3. 6 . With.
8 31. H u l l . 2 62.
A RARE inhabitant of mountainous rocky heaths. Mr.
Dickson found it on Ben Nevis ; Mr. Turner gathered our
present specimens in fructification in the vicinity of Lough
Bray, Ireland, and we have found it, without fructification,
but "with very fine red fibres on the stem, on Cromford moor
near Matlock. It bears fruit at uncertain periods during the
summer months.
The stems are perennial, branched, leafy, growing in tufts,
from 1 to 3 inches high, clothed with delicate dense fibres, or
radicles, which are either of a rusty brown, or almost blood-
red. Some branches are occasionally elongated, and furnished
rather with scales than leaves. The leaves in general are
curved to one side, at least in the young growing plant, and
are yellowish, shining, awlshaped, entire, with a very slender,
slightly zigzag, point, and a dilated concave base, in which a
broadish pellucid rib, that vanishes upwards, is more or less
visible. Fruitstalks solitary, erect, of a pale, pellucid brown,
twisted when dry, enveloped at the base with some dilated
sheathing leaves. Capsule a little incurved, cylindrical, with
a fine taper lid of about half its own length ; when old furrowed
or angular in the upper part. Fringe small, brown.