04 THORE^. 



Fam. II. THOREiE. 



Char. Main filaments solid, inarticulate, filiform, branched, 

 beset with short byssoidal, simple, or sometimes ramose 

 and articulated fihrillce. Reproduction, according to 

 Kutzing, capsular, and springing from the fibrillcB. 



2. THOREA Borij, 



Char. Same as those of the family. 



Thorea Bory, in Annales du Museum, xii. 126. t. 18. 

 (excel, sp. fig. 34.) Hydroph. Voy. Dupern. t. 24. fig. 3. 

 Agardh species, ii. 123. Poly coma Vv^\^, in Journ. Bot. 

 108. p. 123. 



^* The ThorecB appear to be related to the Batrachosperms, 

 with which M. Decandolle has confounded the species dis- 

 covered by M. Thore. They ought to follow them in a 

 classification. Like them, they present filaments of two 

 kinds, and they are, for the most part, slippery under the 

 fingers when one touches them ; but the filiform filaments 

 with which the plant is clothed are neither fasciculated nor 

 verticillate. Whatever may be the fructification of the 

 Thorece, it can never be disposed like that of the Batracho- 

 sperms, which consists of naked buds aggregated and placed 

 in the centre of the verticilli, or wholly formed by the 

 branches. 



" With the exception of the last species, which is a parasite 

 of certain lichens, the Thorece are aquatic plants. They 

 dwell in the coldest fountains, have an aspect Avhich is 

 jDeculiar, extreme flexibility, the property of uniting themselves 

 into mucous masses at the sources of waters, adhere strongly 

 to paper in drying, and take on the appearance of life when 

 they are replunged into the liquid in which they have grown." 

 — Bory de St. Vincent. 



