s 9 [ 3 9 ° ]
J l c<.n u * B R Y U M fontanum.
Fountain Bryum,
CRY PT OG AM I A Mujci.
G en. Char. Capf. with a lid. Veil fmooth. Flower-
Jlalk from a terminal tubercle.
Spec. Char. Capfule oblique, roundifh. Stem branched.
Leaves ovate, acute, a little remote, entire.
Syn. Bryum fontanum. Hudf. FI. An. 4 7 5 . Sibth.
Ox. 28 9.
B. paluftre, fcapis teretibus ftellatis, capfulis magnis
fubrotundis. Dill. Mufc. 340. t. 4 4 . ƒ. 2.
Mnium fontanum, Linn. Sp. PI. 1 5 7 4 . TVith.Bot.
A rr. v. 3 . 85. Lightf. Scot. 708.
Mufcus paluftris Adianto aureo affinis, fcapis tenui-
bus, foliolis brevibus. Rail Syn. 9 8 .
F R E Q U E N T in the boggy foil about clear cold fprings on
mountainous commons and heaths, very confpicuous at a dif-
ftance from the wide yellowilh patches it forms in fuch fitua-
tions, and often occupying the whole courfe of a rivulet through
a fmall alpine meadow.
Roots perennial, tufted, brown, ftems eredt, thickly clufter-
ed together, leafy, {lender, generally once divided into 3 or
more branches from one centre, with now and then a ftraggling
branch befides, fo that we could fcarcely have believed Linnaeus
had intended the fame mofs, were not his own Lapland
fpecimens now before us. The leaves are fmall, ovate, (harp-
pointed, but little fpreading, frequently fo thinly fet that the
red Item appears between them. Male flowers in large terminal
heads, confiding of numerous yellow antherse, furrounded
by a circle of large fpreading leaves. Fruit-dalks from the
divarication of the branches on a different plant from the male
flowers, long, {lender, each bearing a large globofe oblique capfule,
with a fmall beaked lid. Thefe capfules are to be found
throughout the fummer.
We do not hefitate to refer this and the preceding to the
genus Bryum rather than Mnium, as the male flowers of the
latter ought to be quite naked. Linnaeus ran counter to that
definition in reckoning every thing a Mnium in which male
flowers were difcoverable at all, whether naked or leafy.