402 THE INHABITANTS OF THE SHA. 
their own coasts, boil them to a thick jelly, and bring them to 
market under the name of Dschin-schan, as artificial birds’= 
nests. The Dutch call it Agar-ayar, and make great use of it; 
simple boiling sufficing to convert the dried substance into a 
thick uniform jelly, which is both nourishing and easy of diges- 
tion. Thus we see that the algze, which the Romans considered 
so perfectly worthless that, when they wished to express their 
utter contempt of an object, they declared it to be still viler 
than the vile sea-weed, are by no means deserving of so hard a 
sentence. Man himself might be much more justly reproached 
for neglecting the abundant stores of nourishment which nature 
has gratuitously provided for him on all flat and rocky coasts. 
lor not only the species I have mentioned are eatable, but also 
some of the commonest fuci of our seas (/’weus nodosus, F. vesi- 
culosus, Laminaria saccharina), as well as the gigantic alarias 
and durvilleas of the colder oceanic regions. And yet how 
rare is their use, notwithstanding the increasing wants of a 
rapidly growing population ! 
Besides the larger forms of vegetation, the ocean contains a 
vast number of microscopical plants. Among these the most 
remarkable are the Diatomacew, simple vegetable cells enclosed 
in a flinty envelope, consisting of two plates closely applied 
to each other like the two valves of a mussel. The forms of 
these minute organisms are no A 
less curious than those of the 
Foraminifera, for they exhibit 
regular mathematical figures, 
and their surface is often 
most delicately sculptured. 
Multiplying by spontaneous 
fissure, many of the Diatoms 
are met with entirely free 
after the process of duplicative Peery eee ree, 
subdivision has once been com- 4. Frontview. B.Binsty kubdinse 
pleted, while others, such as the 
Licmophora, or Fan-bearer, an elegant native species, habitually 
remain coherent one to another, producing clusters or filaments 
of various shapes, connected by a gelatinous investment or by a 
stalk-like appendage, which serves to attach them to other 
plants or to stones and to pieces of wood. Thongh individually 
