I3O A NEW ZEALAND NATURALIST'S CALENDAR. 



which grows on the rocks and reefs of our coast, forming 

 the best natural breakwater they possess, is the huge 

 Macrocystis, which usually grows 50 feet or more in length, 

 and is said by Hooker to reach "700 feet or upwards." 

 From these giants we reach, in a diminishing series, minute 

 unicellular plants, not more, perhaps, than one-thousandth 

 of an inch in diameter. Yet all belong to the same vast 

 family of Algfe. It is curious to recall the fact that when 

 Linnaeus, nearly 150 years ago, classified plants, he divided 

 the flowering plants into twenty -three orders, and assigned 

 all the rest the non- flowering plants (including Algae, 

 Fungi, Mosses, Liverworts, and a host of lower organisms) 

 to his twenty-fourth order. The fact of his classifying 

 them so does no discredit to the marvellous classiflcatory 

 powers of the great naturalist it only shows how vastly 

 the knowledge of these humbler forms has been increased, 

 so that now Linnaeus's twenty-fourth order is known to 

 include far more forms of life than all his twenty-three 

 others, even though the flowering plants named so far 

 number between two and three hundred thousand. 



But to come back to our reefs and rock-pools, from 

 which let us hope the tide has receded to its farthest 

 limits. Where plant life is so abundant animal life is 

 sure also to abound. Nearly all families are represented, 

 of course by forms specially modified for living under the 

 special conditions of the littoral zone. A feature of many 

 of them is that they are protectively coloured so as to 

 escape observation ; dark green worms may be seen 

 creeping over the green weed ; in some places on the weed 

 are green shrimps, while in the bottoms of the pools are 

 reddish and sand-coloured species. Here are amphipods 

 of most elegant colours (allied to the sandhoppers) swim- 

 ming in the pools. They are often of most elegant colours, 

 spotted or banded with blue, brown, purple, or black, on a 

 grey or pink ground. Placed in a small transparent vessel 

 of clear sea-water they look bizarre and conspicuous ; but 

 try to find them as they swim to a bit of coloured seaweed 

 and rest on its fronds why, they are almost invisible. 

 Here we meet with pearly-white or lemon-yellow sea-slugs 



