CONFERVACEJ5. 139 



chrome, and about once and a-half as long as broad, and here and there, 

 at irregulai intervals, two proximate articulations, longer and broader 

 than the rest, form together a spindle-shaped swelling, in which a dark- 

 coloured endochrome collects, the mass being darkest and densest where 

 the two cells touch each other. This looks like the commencement of 

 fructification, but I am unable to say whether a sporangium is ultimately 

 formed. These dark-coloured double cells are frequently so numerous 

 that they give the filaments, when examined with a pocket lens, a varie- 

 gated appearance. Substance membranaceous, and in drying the plant 

 scarcely adheres to paper." Harvey. 



Plate L1V. fig. 1. Portion of thread of Chcetomorpha litorea X 100 

 diam. 



Chsetomorpha linum. (Roth.} Kutz. Tab. ill., t. 55, /. 3. 



Rather rigid, dark green, or now and then yellowish green 

 and less rigid, lower articulations equal or almost equal in 

 length to their diameter, upper articulations, before division, 

 two or three times as long as the diameter, or even four times, 

 here and there swollen. Cell-membrane of the lower articula- 

 tions thick, distinctly lamellose. the upper ones thinner and 

 indistinctly lamellose, contracted at the joints. 



SIZE. Threads '25 mm. thick. 



Rabh. Alg. Eur. iii., 327. Harv. Phyc. Britt., t. 150, f. A. 



Conferva linum, Ag. Syst. 97. Eng. Bot. ii., t. 2363. 



Conferva capillaris, Huds. Fl. Ang., p. 598. Lightf. Fl. 

 Scot. 988. Dillw. Conf., t. 9. 



Conferva crassa, Eng. Fl. v., 252. Mack. Fl. Heb. 225. 



In brackish and salt water. 



" Filaments from a few inches to several feet in length, twice as thick 

 as a hog's bristle, very much curled, rigid, crisp, and brittle, soon becom- 

 ing flaccid if exposed to the air ; lying in thick but not dense bundles, 

 of considerable length, disposed in strata, one above the other. Articu- 

 lations about as long as broad, filled with granular fluid, which in some 

 joints is more dense than in others. Eventually the joints divide in the 

 centre by a transverse line, and the mass separates, a new diaphragm is 

 then gradually formed, and finally a new joint. This species varies 

 much in colour, being sometimes of a pale, at other times a dark green, 

 and is very often mottled with dark and light green. Substance rigid- 

 membraneous, scarcely adhering to paper in drying." Harvey. 



Plate L1V. fig. 2. Portion of sterile thread of Clioetomorplia linum 

 X 100. Fig. 3, portion of fertile thread with zoogonidia X 100. Fig. 4, 

 zoogonidia X 300. 



Chaetomorpha sutoxia. (Berk.} 



Dark green, crispate, rather rigid, interwoven in lax tufts, 

 articulations one and a-half times as long as broad, after 

 division shorter than the diameter, cell-membrane thick, dis- 

 tinctly lamellose. 



SIZE. Threads -01-'012 mm. diam. 



Con/erva suton'a, Berk. Glean., t. 14, f. 3. Harv. Man. 

 128. Phyc. Britt., 1. 150, f. B. 



In brackish ditches, estuaries, and salt water. 



