1917] Gardner: New Pacific Coast Marine Algae I 395 



brighter red color than those found growing higher np on the rocks. 

 Further search and investigation will doubtless extend the range of 

 the species much to the north and to the south of its present known 

 limits. 



Professor Setcliell has suspected for several years that this form 

 had not been described and some time ago gave it the provisional name 

 Hiklenhrandtia occidentalis. He had not been fortunate, however, 

 in collecting it in its fruiting season and had thus not been able 

 to verify his suspicions. Ample fruiting material having now been 

 assembled, it can no longer remain in doubt that the form has not 

 previously been described. The publication has been somewhat de- 

 laj-ed on account of a recent discovery we have made which involves 

 the relationship between the genera Hildenhrandti^ and Besa, the 

 latter of which was published by Professor Setchell (1912, p. 236), 

 based on material collected at Lands End, San Francisco. The 

 material was very limited in quantity, growing on a single rock. The 

 diminutive papillae were looked upon as parasitic upon a broadly 

 expanded rock-encrusting form which was considered at the time to 

 be Hildenhrandtia, and although no tetraspores were found the struc- 

 ture made it appear to be the same as H. occidentalis which has since 

 been found to grow in profusion in the same locality. Recently we 

 have found abundance of material of Besa growing on the same rock 

 on which it was originally' discovered. Also I have found it growing 

 in much greater abundance near Cypress Point, Monterey County, 

 California, and have carefully prepared quantities of very tliin sec- 

 tions by means of a freezing device. This has enabled us to determine 

 what Professor Setchell suspected might prove to be tlie case, viz., 

 tluit these papillae actuall}' belong to the expanded basal th alius, 

 being specialized developments to bear the carpogonia and the an- 

 theridia, the latter of which had not been seen until recently. The 

 similarity of structure between the sterile thallus of Hildenhrandtia 

 and Besa makes it appear as though they are merely the sexual and 

 the nonsexual plants of the same genus. As the plants of tlie two 

 genera grow at Lands End, there is a very sliglit difference in the 

 size of the cells of the two genera, but the diiference is not greater 

 than is ordinarily allowed within the limits of variation in a species. 

 Two conditions met with, however, seem to militate against the two 

 forms belonging to the same species. At Cypress Point Besa grows 

 in profusion, but I was not able to find any tetrasporic Hilden- 

 hrandtia. Material of Hildenhrandtia scraped from the rocks and 



