25i 



HARD WICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



secured. These are usually called sea-mats, of 

 which one kind is so common everywhere. The 

 larger of the two kinds now found is much more 

 delicate than the common Flustra foliacea, figured 

 in a former volume of this ; journal. It is named 

 Flustrd truncata (fig. 148), and when a portion of it 

 is mounted in a cell, and examined with a low power 



Tig. 148. Flustra truncata, nat. size. 



Fig. 149. Portion of same, x 60. 



of the microscope, it is a very pretty object, even 

 when all its inhabitants are dead and gone (fig. 149). 

 The second specimen was smaller, more tufted, 

 still more delicate and fragile. It is Flustra char- 

 tacea, the Papery Sea-mat (fig. 150), more common 

 on the coast at Hastings than on almost any other 

 spot around Britain. Like its congener, this also, 

 when magnified, is a very interesting object. What 



myriad inhabitants must have once tenanted this 

 delicate little tuft, which is now blown along the 

 sand with every puff of wind ! And yet every one 

 of these openings (fig. 151) was once the door of a 

 tenanted dwelling. 



Fig;. 150. FlustrU ckartacea. 



Fig. 151. Portion of same, x 60. 



Fig. 152. Membranipora pilo.ia encrusting sea-weed, 

 nat. size. 



