RESULTS OF METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS MADE AT THE LATITUDE 51° 28′ 6′′ N., LONGitude 0° 18′ 47′′ w. *To obtain the Barometric pressure at the sea-level these numbers must be increased by ⚫097 inch. HOURLY MOVEMENT OF THE WIND (IN MILES) AS RECORDED BY ROBINSON'S ANEMOMETER.-JUNE 1863. 30 22 25 29 29 Day. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 Hourly Means. A. M. 962254 P. M. 67 988 857 654 94775887 9786 R97766 61708 2645418 10 14 11 8 29 Total Daily Move ment. 200 208 139 199 389 333 365 421 292 323 450 181 250 172 228 202 184 153 241 180 254 329 123 102 141 163 350 199 187 202 THE STUDY OF MOSSES.* THE most obtuse observer cannot wander through the country without admiring the beauty of mosses. In many places they carpet the ground with a rich living pile of pleasant green, in others they clothe the rocks, form a vesture for the tree-trunk, enrich the parti-coloured thatch on the quaint old cottage, or sedulously haunt the crevice of the wall. In a technological sense they are not of much use, except in the condition of peat; perhaps simply because man is not yet sufficiently instructed to know what to do with them: but in the world of nature they play an important part, making their appearance at times and under circumstances when higher forms of vegetation would not grow. Thousands and millions are the tons of mineral and aeriform matter which they transmute every season into their delicate tissues; and when these decay, they produce no inconsiderable amount of vegetable soil. They likewise form the home and shelter for numerous minute insects, even for rotifers; and they tell their story of the wonderful ways of life and organization not less strikingly than the widest spreading, or the loftiest soaring, of the stateliest families of trees. Like all low, or comparatively lowly members of the organic world, they contribute most importantly to our knowledge of the laws, processes, and structures that distinguish living beings. We cannot assert that they constitute a page of nature's primer, and furnish elementary lessons in A, B, C, for her human pupils to study; as little was known, or could be known of them, or of objects standing upon a similar or lower grade of structural rank, until science had been considerably advanced, and instruments like the microscope had been fabricated to assist in the delicate and complicated labours of research. The simplest form of life is not after all simple in any ordinary sense of the word. We talk of "unicellular plants and animals," but Professor Karstent tells us this is erroneous, "owing to the complicated structure of the tissue cells which enter into the composition of developed organisms ;" and if we mastered the structure of the cell, we should still be puzzled to account for the functions which it performs, some of which we know to be physical, while we call others "vital," without attaching any precise or definite meaning to the term. Still, though nature's secrets lie always deep, we are Handbook of British Mosses, comprising all that are known to be Natives of the British Isles. By the Rev. M. J. Berkeley, M.A., F.L.S., author of "Introduction to Cryptogamic Botany," "" Outlines of British Fungology," etc. Lovell Reeve & Co. † See Annals of Natural History, No. 67. materially assisted in unravelling them by the examination of objects that present fewest complications; and hence, among others, mosses are very useful to the scientific botanist, as they are sure from their beauty to interest the more casual observer. Unfortunately, they do not readily admit of any classification which is natural and intelligible. In the Micrographic Dictionary, which has a high reputation for its botanical articles, the system of Müller is followed, while Mr. Berkeley considers that the arrangement of Dr. Montagne in D'Orbigny's Dictionary is the most convenient as regards the natural orders, and he tells us he has adopted it with few exceptions. He arranges the mosses under four orders-Pleurocarpi, with the fruit lateral and springing immediately from the stem; Acrocarpi, with the fruit terminal; Schistocarpi, with the fruit splitting longitudinally into four or more valves, adhering above; and Syncladei, mosses with fasciculate branches. The artificial group, Cladocarpi, with terminal fruit on short lateral branches, he judiciously arranges under other heads, on the ground that it is not strictly natural, and the character is difficult of application, as Acrocarpus and Cladocarpus species occur in the same genus." The shape of the spore vessel or capsule, the form of the hood, the presence or absence of the peristome, and its exquisite rows of finely-coloured teeth, the shape of the cells forming the leaf tissue, and the mode of branching-these are the chief points to be attended to in the examination of mosses; but it is to be regretted that as yet no sufficiently dominating characters have been discovered to enable those who have devoted themselves to the inquiry to establish genera which are at once intelligible, and correspond with natural conditions. Mr. Berkeley, who is no mean authority on these subjects, after devoting, as his present work proves, much attention to the question, tells us that "on the whole, the state of Bryology must be considered as extremely imperfect," and he adds, "the entire subject clearly wants the revision of some master mind." The reproductive processes in mosses are very curious and characteristic. As is common with plants, and with many animals, they have two or more modes of multiplication-the one a genuine sexual process, the others belonging to the category of budding. In the elegant urns, which form such beautiful objects for the microscope, the moss produces spores; but the result of their germination differs materially from that of the spores of ferns. Mr. Berkeley thus comments upon this subject:-"In ferns and their allies, the result of germination is the production of a cellular expansion of various forms, whether globose, or scale-like, or irregular, whether more or less differen |