Title: The Bryologist
Identifier: bryologis192019161917grou (find matches)
Year: 1898 (1890s)
Authors: Grout, A. J. (Abel Joel), b. 1867; Smith, Annie Morrill; Jennings, Otto Emery, 1877-; American Bryological and Lichenological Society; American Bryological Society
Subjects: Mosses; Liverworts; Lichens; Botany; Bryology
Publisher: St. Louis, Mo. (etc. ) American Bryological and Lichenological Society
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

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-87- NOTES ON FISSIDENS I. Difficulties in Determining the Oldest Species Elizabeth G. Britton
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The cut given above is taken from the title-page of Hedwig's Species Mus- corum, published after his death, by Schwaegrichen at Leipzig in 1801. Several interesting facts may be noted, first that it is a simple microscope, second that the object appears to be dry, without slide or cover glass, and furthermore the plant was evidently not much dissected. These Hmitations, will explain why even 'Hhe father of bryology' may have occasionally included more than one species under one name! But, when we remember "Gray's Botanist's Microscope" as advertised in the back of Gray's Manual as late as 1878 and our first compound microscope, with two or three tiny objectives, and recall the blurry uncertain images that resulted therefrom, we cannot help wondering at the artistic skill and accuracy of many of the old plates published in the last part of the i8th and the early part of the 19th centuries. The principle of the compound microscope was discovered as early as 1590 but no great improvement was made in it for over two centuries. All the earlier English and French microscopes in the Cox collection, at the New York Botanical Garden, showing the history of the development of the microscope, prove that a very small objective with poor illumination, was in general use and the makers seem to have striven to produce a small, portable and compact instrument, that

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