HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



' 193 



EEMAMS ON THE lEKEGULAPtlTY OF APPEAEANCE 

 OF SOME SPECIES OF MAKINE ALG.E. 



By W. H. GRATTANN. 



'OR a number of years 

 at different periods 

 of my seaweed ga- 

 therings, I have been 

 struck with the fre- 

 quent irregularity of 

 appearance of many 

 of Marine AlgJE on 

 different parts of our coasts, 

 some species bein.:? found in 

 abundance during one season^ 

 and either sparingly the fol- 

 lowing year, or not again for 

 several seasons; while others 

 will suddenly appear in quan- 

 tity, and, in the course of a 

 season or two, as unaccount- 

 ably disappear altogether. 



As the contents of this paper 

 are the result chiefly of my 

 own personal experience as a collector of British 

 seaweeds, I will give a number of instances of the 

 irregularity of growth and appearance of several 

 of our common, as well as our rare alga;. 



About fourteen years ago I paid a visit of six 

 weeks to Plymouth and its vicinity, devoting the 

 whole of that period to the science of algology ; 

 not merely in collecting plants and mounting them, 

 but in studying and almost watching their growth, 

 and observing various peculiarities connected with 

 marine vegetation which seemed to me peculiai'ly 

 interesting, and diflerent in so many respects to 

 anything I had observed in land plants. 1 naturally 

 went prepared to make a great collection, and in- 

 vented for the purpose a press capable of receiving 

 a hundred^ plants at one time, and many a night 1 

 sat up at my work, until the first streaks of morr . 

 No. 105. 



ing warned me to desist : but in truth, 1 believe I 

 am a good finder, and as I daily collected a vast 

 number of specimens, I rared more to preserve my 

 " treasures of the deep " than my health, and so I 

 was (as I have said) at it, day and night, for six 

 weeks. In addition to my seaweed press, I went 

 armed with a good compound microscope, and thus 

 during the operation of preparing plants for my 

 herbarium, I had constant opportunities of studying 

 and examining the structure and fructification of 

 algse in the fresh living state ; than which no objects 

 in nature with which I am acquainted are, when 

 examined fresh from the water, more curious and 

 beautiful. My studies were thus a constant living- 

 enthusiasm, for not only was my primary investiga- 

 tion a never-ending source of delight to me, but 

 upon every occasion of portions of seaweeds being 

 subjected to examination, the microscope revealed 

 to my delighted eyes numbers of tiny marine crea- 

 tures, some of which were clinging to the plants, 

 others were chasing each other, either in sport or 

 as prey; and again, I occasionally met thus with 

 beautiful and rare diatoms, minute zoophytes and 

 young brittle stars, and many other wonders of the 

 deep, some of which were familiar to me, others new 

 and strange. 



Two instances I may mention, as they occurred 

 on a memorable day. It was that in which tiie 

 Agamemnon came into Plymouth Sound after her 

 first voyage in returning from laying the Atlantic 

 cable. I had that d;iy been down to the great Mew- 

 stone Rock, to gather some specimens of the rare 

 Callithamhion brachiatum, which grew luxuriantly 

 on the tips of the large oarweeds on some rocks 

 below Langden, some five miles down the coast. 

 These rocks, my boatman said, were called " the 

 Sliders," and not by any means an inappropriate 



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