without order ; these secondaries bearing a third or fourth series of similar 

 but still shorter branchlets. Both the main frond, the branches, and ramuli 

 are bordered at distances of about a line, with slender setaceo-subulate 

 cilia. The cilia are horizontally patent or recurved, two lines long, and are 

 either simple or pectinated on one side with a second series of similar cilia. 

 The conceptacles are ovate, sessile immediately beneath the point of the 

 smaller branches, their aperture being directed away from the apex of the 

 branch : those examined (probably immature) did not contain any true 

 spores, but a tuft of dichotomous, very slender, beaded filaments or para- 

 7iemata. The colour is a deep full-red, becoming paler and more rosy in 

 fresh-water. The substance is peculiarly soft and flaccid, and in drying the 

 frond adheres most closely to paper. 



This is mucli the most slender, most flaccid, and most diff'usely 

 branched species of Delisea, and is also one of the largest. 

 Some of the most finely branched specimens are exceedingly 

 slender and delicate, and beautifully feathery, with a habit more 

 like that of a Hypnea than of the genus to which, by its fruit 

 and structure, it truly belongs. It is not very uncommon at 

 Western Port, but much rarer, apparently, in Tasmania. 



Perfect conceptacles are still a desideratum. Those examined 

 by me were either in an immature or an abortive state. None 

 contained any true spores ; and whether the moniliform filaments 

 shown at Pig. 4 be the commencement of spores or merely para- 

 nemata is uncertain. 



Fig. 1. Delisea HYPNEOiDES, — the natural size. 2. Small portion of a branch, 

 withramulus. 3. Apex of a fruiting-branch, with its conceptacle. 4. Some 

 of the barren filaments {paranemata) from the conceptacle : — variously 

 magnified. 



