Ser. MELANOSPEUMEiB. Fam. Sporoc/moidea. 



Plate XIX. 



SPOROCHNUS MOOREI, Ban. 



Gen. Char. Frond filiform, solid, pinnately decompound. Receptacles 



pod-shaped, pedicellate, crowned with a tuft of soft hairs, and densely 



covered with whorled, branching, sporiferous filaments. Spores ob- 



ovoid, attached to the sides of the filaments. — Sporochnus {Ag.), 



from <nropo<?, a seed, and x voo<i > wool, because tufts of soft hairs 



crown the fructification. 



Frons jiliformis, solida, pinnatim ramosa. Receptacida siliquteformia, pedi- 

 cellata, apice comosa, paranematibus ramosis horizontalibus verticillatis den- 

 sissime vestita. Sporee obovoidece, ad paranemata laterales. 



Sporochnus Moorei ; frond filiform, slender, repeatedly decompound ; 

 receptacles cylindrical, on pedicels many (4-8 or more) times their 

 own length. 



S. Moorei ; fronde tenui ranwsissima ; receptaculis cylindraceis pedicello fili- 

 formi multiplo (4-8-plo) brevioribus. 



Sporochnus Moorei, Harv. Alg. Exsic. Austr. n. 51. 



Hab. Dredged in Paramatta River, Sydney, Charles Moore, Esq.; W.H.H. 



Geogr. Distr. Only known in one locality, but there abundant in May and 

 June. 



Descr. Root a small disc. Fronds 2-3 feet long or more, scarcely thicker than 

 hog's-bristle, cylindrical, glabrous, very much branched ; the branches alter- 

 nate, 1-2 feet long, and once or twice alternately decompound. The lesser 

 branches and their subdivisions are subdistant, and very unequal in length, 

 and the habit of the frond is singularly lax and slender. The receptacles 

 are exactly linear, obtuse at each end, cylindrical, one to two lines in length, 

 and borne on filiform pedicels, which, when full-grown, are often more than 

 an inch in length. In the young plant (as in all the genus) the tips of the 

 branches and of the receptacles are crowned with a dense tuft of soft, arti- 

 culated hairs. The axis of the receptacle is densely cellular ; its parane- 

 mata are irregularly dichotomous, their terminal cellules clavate ; and they 

 bear laterally numerous small oblong spores. Colour, when recent, a pale 

 tawny-olive, becoming greener in fresh-water and in drying. Substance, 

 when young, soft and closely adhering to paper ; horny, when old. 



The Australian Nereis is rich in species of Sporochnus, and 

 the plant here figured is one of the most distinctly characterized. 

 It differs from every known species in the very great length of 



