“tings can get very lively at times.”

    I asked roversy.

    “ell, ed on us by one of your countrymen,” ly, andopened a y reference aining illustrations of mosses ableceristic to tructed eye y one to anot,” apping a moss, “used to be one genus, Drepanocladus. No’s been reorganized intotorfia, and acoulis.”

    “And did t lead to blows?” I asked perouch hopefully.

    “ell, it made sense. It made perfect sense. But it meant a lot of reordering of collectionsand it put all t of date for a time, so t of, you know, grumbling.”

    Mosses offer mysteries as o moss peopleanyiring type called anfordensis, y in California and later also found gro tip of England, but ered anyo exist in tions is anybody’s guess. “It’snoher revision.”

    e nodded tfully.

    must be compared o make sure t it been recorded already. tion must be ten and illustrationsprepared and t publisable journal. takesless tietury  a great age for moss taxonomy. Mucury’s ed to untangling tions left beeentury.

    t ing. (You may recall t C moss man.) One aptly named Englis, ed Britis ributed to tinction of several species. But it is to sucs t Len Ellis’s collection is one of t compreo large folded ss of orian script. Some, for all  Victorian botanist, unveiler of Broion and tany department for its first ty-oneyears until  in lustrous old mas sostrikingly fine t I remarked upon them.

    “Oifying a recent purc to s tfully, as if for t time in a longw know hem in bryology,” he added.