134 HISTORY OF BRITISH ZOOPHYTES. 



states, "of long trailing branches, with very sharp teeth, 

 ])laced in pairs exactly opposite ; each pair seems to be 

 jointed into the next. The slender branches grow in tufts 

 like bunches of hair. On the Ayrshire coast I have never 

 observed it on anything but Laminaria digitatay and seldom 

 more than three inches in height, but EngHsh specimens are 

 often six, and Irish specimens sometimes even twelve inches 

 in height. 'After a storm, clumps, as large as a child^s 

 fist, are washed ashore .■* {Couch.) The vesicles are irregu- 

 larly scattered on the branches, large, smooth, egg-shaped, 

 and often with a rounded operculum at the top." " It was 

 from the great resemblance," says Dr. Johnston, " of these 

 vesicular ovaries to the capsules of mosses, that the early 

 l)otanists drew an additional argument in behalf of the 

 vegetabiHty of the corallines themselves; and a Darwinian 

 might be, perhaps, forgiven, were he even now to feign 

 how the Nereids stole them from the mossv habitats of 

 Flora's winter and vernal shows, to deck and gem the ar- 

 1)uscular garnitures of their coral caves." 



" Nymphs ! you adorn, in glossy volutes roll'd, 

 The gaudy couch with azure, green, and gold. 

 ***** 

 You chase the wannor shark and cunibrons whale, 

 And guard the mermaid in her briny vale : 



