site, or by abortion alternate, often (when both are present) very unequal, 

 the opposing pinna being reduced to a short ramulus or mere tuft of ramelli. 

 Priiuary pinnre about bipinnate, the pinnules by suppression alternate or 

 unequally opposite, 1-3 inches long. Ultimate pinnules setaceous, 2-3 lines 

 long. The stem, branches, pinna?, and pinnules are corticated with a layer 

 of minute cells, under which coating the primary siphon is, in the younger 

 parts of the frond, partly visible. Every node throughout the frond is 

 clothed with very soft and slender, byssoid, articulated, dichotomous ra- 

 melli, whose joints are very long: these are very abundant on the pinnules 

 and smaller pinnae, but gradually disappear in the older parts of the frond. 

 Ci/stocarps occur, on more slender individuals, at the ends of the pinnae and 

 pinnules ; the broadly pear-shaped spores are mixed with jiaranemata. Te- 

 traspores globose, near the bases of the dichotomous ramelli. The colour, 

 when growing, is a brilliant rosy-red, which in the herbarium is either dis- 

 charged as a stain on the paper, or turns more or less brown. The substance 

 is very soft, and soon becomes gelatinous, and in drying the frond adheres 

 most closely to paper. 



This superb plant, of which I can only, on an octavo plate, 

 present a single branch, well deserves the name Princeps, even 

 in a genus which contains many very beautiful species. It is 

 very nearly aUied in character to the original species (W. pe?n- 

 cillata) upon which Agardh founded the genus WrangeUa ; and 

 is consequently also nearly related to the ]V. ]ol(M^iosa, so com- 

 mon on the shore at Geelong and on the north coast of Tas- 

 mania. But while W. plumosa is greatly larger and more robust 

 than W. peiiiciUata, it is but a pigmy when compared to our 

 W. Princeps. The three stand to each other like steps of stairs, 

 one advancing above the other, but the intervals between each — 

 the steps — are so wide, that (at present) I luust regard the three 

 as distinct species, although, size excepted, they are very similar. 

 The smallest and the largest are of the same rose-red colour, turn- 

 ing broivn in drying; the intermediate (in size) is darJc-pinple, 

 and turns green in drying. 



Fig. 1. A pinnated branch of Wrangelia Princeps, — the natural size. 2. 

 Apex of a ramulus, bearing a naked cystocarp. 3. Spores from the same. 

 4. Frustule of a branch, denuded. 5. Apex of a ramulus, bearing tet^-a- 

 s])ores. 6. A tetraspore, and one of the byssoid ramelli : — more or less 

 magnified. 



