314 PALMELLEiE. 



2. COCCOCHLORIS MUSCICOLA Menegh 



Plate LXXVIII. Figs. 3 a. 3 b. 



Char. " Frond mucous, indefinite, very slender, investing mosses, 

 blackish green ; the smallest globules perfectly spherical, 

 green, generally germinate. Vesicles elliptical, the larger 

 entirely filled with lesser globules, and not surrounded with 

 any marginJ'^ 



P. hyalina, B. muscicola Harv., Manual, p. 177. 



Hab. Aberdeen : Dr. Dickie. 



" The mucous pellicle, blackish green, shining, covers exten- 

 sively mosses, and at the same time includes with our Cocco- 

 chloris, Oscillatoria autumnalis and Nostoc lichenoideum, the 

 Coccochloris globules scarcely measuring the three-thousandth 

 part of a millimetre, imbedded in a soft and easily yielding 

 mucus, in which are mixed, scattered elliptical vesicles, varying 

 in dimensions from the hundredth to the twenty -fifth part 

 of a millemetre, entirely filled with smaller globules closely 

 heaped together. The vesicles themselves are seen to be 

 constituted of a very slender membrane, which embraces them, 

 but not presenting a diaphanous margin, and which by lacera- 

 tion is scarcely to be perceived : when the membrane has been 

 ruptured, the contents of the globules escape into irregular 

 angular heaps. The vesicle from which the globules have 

 proceeded is not apparent : this however is certain, that the 

 globules are not surrounded by any peculiar membrane. 



" The vesicles effused into irregular areolae resemble the 

 beginnings of new fronds, which, evolved in the mucous matrix, 

 and quickly becoming confluent, form a mucous pellicle. Hence 

 the frond is said to be indefinite, although, in the beginning, 

 as in all other species of this genus, it is definite. This spe- 

 cies agrees in habit with Coccochloris protuberans, but in 

 structure and microscopic characters it exhibits greater affi- 

 nity with Coccochloris parietalis, as will be shewn hereafter." 



In drying, it leaves but a mere stain upon the paper, most 

 evident at the margins of the frond. 



