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Chordaria firma E. s. Gepp. 



Nom. Jap. : Ishi-modziiku. 

 PL CXLIII, CXLV, Fig. 1-9. 



Chordaria firma E. S. Gepp. Chinese Mar. Alg. (Jotirn. of 

 Botany Vol. 42, 1904) p. 162, Tab. 460, fig. 7,8). 



Solitary or a few fronds tufted rising from a scutate disc, 

 filiform or cylindrical when old, provided with a more or less 

 traceable percurrent stem, 20-30 cm. high, i mm. or more thick. 

 Branches arise laterally on all sides in an irregularly alternate 

 manner from near the base, elongated and are provided with 

 lesser sorts of the second or third orders. The ramification is in 

 some fronds more regularly alternate, in others more irregular 

 between alternate and dichotomous. In some fronds branches of 

 the fist order arise very near to each other, in others more dis- 

 tantly. In some especially in younger ones, branches are much 

 loaded with ramelli, while in others, mostly in older ones they 

 become naked. The axils are wid^y parted or almost horizontal 

 and the branches are somewhat flexuose. In younger ones bran- 

 ches are soft and pliable, but become coriaceous when old. 



The frond is hollow with a small cavity in the centre. The 

 axile cylinder consists of two layers of densely compacted cells ; 

 the inner layer, of elongated cylindrical cells ; the outer of radially 

 disposed short roundish-angular ones. Thus there is a more or 

 less broad band of short irregular cells between the long central 

 ones and the cortical fringe of assimilatory filaments. This sub- 

 cortical layer is composed of more or less thick walled cells 

 which, in a transverse section of the frond appear radially elon- 



