Ser. GONGYLOSPEKME.E. ( 57 ) Fam. C'KYPTONEMIACE^. 



Plate LXXXIX. 

 GIGARTINA AClCVIjA'RlS.—Lamoii): 



Gen, Char. — Frond cartilaginous, filiform, compressed or flat, consisting of two strata ; 

 inner of longitudinal, interlacing and anastomosing filaments ; the outer of 

 vertical, dicliotomous, articulated filaments, loosely imbedded in a firm jelly, the 

 apical joints of which are minute, moniliform, coloured, not branching, parallel 

 and firmly cohering. Fructification of two kinds, on distinct plants : 1. "External 

 tubercles, containing on a central placenta dense clusters of spores (favellidia), 

 held together by a network of fibres" (Harv.); 2. Tetraspores, "scattered among 

 the filaments of the periphery," or collected into immersed sori. 



GiGARTiNA acicularis. — Fronds cylindrical, irregularly pinnated or 

 subdichotomous, sparingly branched from near the base ; branches very 

 patent, occasionally secixud, often ciu-ved. 



GiGARTiNA acicularis. — Lamour. Ess. p. 49 ; Gaill. Diet. Sc. Nat. vol. liii. p. 305 ; 

 JDubi/, Bot. Gall. p. 953; Grev. Alrj. Brit. p. 147, t. \Q;nooTc. Br. Fl. 

 vol. ii. p. 300; Wyatt, Ahj. Damn. No. 26; /. Ac/.Alg. Medit. p. 105; 

 Mont. Fl. Alrj. p. 100 ; Kiitz. Phyc. Gen. p. 403 ; /. G. Agardh, Sp. 

 Gen. Al(j. vol. ii. p. 263 ; Harv. P. B. plate 104 ; Han: Man. p. 140 ; 

 Harv. Syn. p. 113; Atlas, plate 50, fig. 201. 



SPHiEROCoccus acicularis. — Ag. Sp. Alg. vol. i. p. 322; Ag. Sysf. p. 237. 



Fucus acicularis. — W^df. Crypt. Aquat. No. 50 ; Turn. Hist. t. 126 ; Sm. Eng. 

 Bot. t. 2190. 



Hab. — On submarine rocks near low-water mark. Annual. Winter. Rare. Corn- 

 wall {W. Bashleigh) ; Ilfracombe, Lupton Cove, and Torquay (Mrs. Griffiths); Sidmouth 

 (Miss Cutler); Jersey {Misses White and Turner); Belfast Bay {Mr. Templeton) ; 

 Valentia, abundant ; Kilkee, very rare {Dr. Harvey). 



Geogr. Dist. — Abundant on the shores of France and Spain ; Mediterranean Sea ; 

 Indian Ocean ( Wight) ; Tasmania {Dr. HooJcer). 



Description. — Root, a minute disc, with few branching fibres. Fronds 

 much tufted, two to four inches high, and half a line to a line in diameter, 

 much branched in a somewhat irregularly bipinnated manner, mostly 

 scattered, sometimes fascicled, occasionally dichotomous, very patent, 

 sometimes recurved, with gradually acuminated points, and more or less 

 attenuated to the base ; sometimes the ramuli are few, short and spine- 

 like, set on at right angles to the stem ; at other times they are considerably 

 elongated and again subdivided in a similar manner ; sometimes the main 

 stem or principal branch is vmdivided to the summit, and then fm-nished 

 with a dense fascicle of simple or compound branches, in a regular 

 VOL. n. I 



