158 HISTORY OF BRITISH ZOOPHYTES. 



•' New buds and bulbs the living fabric shoots, 

 On lengthening branches, and protruding roots. 

 Or on the father's side from bursting glands, 

 Th' adhering young its nascent form expands ; 

 In branching lines the parent trunk adorns, 

 And parts, ere long, like plumage, hairs, or horns." 



Darwin's Temple of Nature. 



Family CAMPANULARIAD^. 



Character. Polypidoms plant-like, horny, rooted by a creeping 

 tubular fibre, branched or simple ; the polype-cells thin and 

 f-ampanulate, terminal, elevated on a ringed footstalk, disposed 

 either alternately or irregular : ova in horny deciduous capsules. 

 Polypes with a single series of filiform tentacula ; the mouth 

 })roboscidiform. Embryo medusiform. — Dr. Johnston. 



Genus XIII. LAOMEDEA, Lamouroux. 



Gen. Char. Polypidom rooted by a creeping fibre, plant -like, 

 erect, jointed at regular inten'als, the joints ringed, incrnssated, 

 giving origin, alternately from opposite sides, to the shortly pe- 

 dicled cells : cells campanulate : vesicles axillary. Polypes hydra- 

 form. — Dr. Johnston. 



1. Laomedea dichotoma, Sea -thread Coralline, Ellis. 

 (Plate X. fig. 30.) 



Hab. On old shells and other bodies within tide-mark. 



