Frances Elizabeth Tripp
Frances Elizabeth Tripp (1 August 1832 – 26 December 1890) was an English bryologist, illustrator, author of children's books, and philanthropist. She is noteworthy for her popular book British Mosses, their homes, aspects, structure and uses (1868; 2nd edition 1874; 3rd edition 1888). The two-volume work has 108 illustrations, which she etched on copper plates.
Quotes
[edit]British Mosses, Their Homes, Aspects, Structure, and Uses (1868)
[edit]One of our English mosses grows on the highest plant-line of the Chimborazo, ... another is among the five which Dr. Hooker discovered at the "Ultima Thule of antarctic vegetation, Cockburn Island, lat. 60º 24' S."
- British Mosses, Their Homes, Aspects, Structure, and Uses: With a Figure of Each Species Etched from Nature. London: Bell & Daldy. 1868. pp. 3–4.
- In the botanical system of Linnæus mosses were placed among the Cryptogamic plants. It is true that the various parts of their fruit are so small as only to be fully examined by the help of a microscope, but the flower and fruit as a whole may on most species be easily seen.
- In the order of the universe we find that the use of mosses is primarily to other and more highly organized plants. They are spread at the roots of trees, and by their depth keeps the warmth about them in winter, and the moisture in summer, which are necessary to their growth. But when they grow on their trunks and branches, mosses injure trees, by clogging their breathing pores. We next find that mosses are useful to the insect tribe, countless numbers of which find homes among their branches, and roam about in their shades as in mighty forests, and look with their thousand eyes upon the wonders of their gauzy leaves, and sun their wings of purple and gold, and burnish their shining armour upon the polished columns of their urns. Over her nest the carder-bee constructs a dome of moss; and ascending higher yet, we find the bird's nest "built of wool and hay and moss."
- p. 31 (The quotation "built of wool and hay and moss" references the poem Questions and Answers by Jane Taylor and Ann Taylor.)
External links
[edit]
- Lawley, Mark (October 2010) . "Frances Elizabeth Tripp (1832–1890)". Field Bryology 102: 50–51.