THE PAGE OF NATURE. 163 



while contemplating a cluster of this little alga, in those 

 pure, clear, sunny wells, with which he sometimes meets in 

 his wanderings among the hills, springing up far away in 

 lonely spots, where the curlew builds her nest among 

 the rushes, their mossy sides starred with the large, 

 snow-white flowers of the grass of Parnassus, and 

 adorned with the closed hoods and diamond-studded 

 leaves of the sun-dew. Every movement of the tiny 

 fairy exemplifies the curve of beauty, every filament 

 winds ceaselessly and rapidly through a thousand forms 

 of matchless grace. When removed from the water, 

 however, the filaments lose all trace of organization, and 

 slip through the fingers like a piece of jelly or frog- 

 spawn. The Batrachospermum occurs in the Ganges, 

 in North America, Herniite Island near Cape Horn, 

 and New Zealand, and is probably distributed all over 

 the world. " One curious circumstance in this plant is, 

 that the threads of the knot-like masses send decurrent 

 joints down the stem, thus making that compound which 

 was originally simple." 



On shady walls and thatched roofs, at the foot of 

 rocks and houses in damp situations, may often be seen 

 a stratum of densely-crowded transparent green leaves, 

 plaited and wrinkled with rounded lobes. This plant, 

 called Ulva crispa, is the terrestrial variety of .the u 

 familiar green laver*of the sea- coast. Another species of * 

 the same genus (U. bulbosa), occasionally fills stagnant 

 pools and ditches of fresh water, with its excessively 

 soft and lubricous masses, appearing as if in a state of 

 fermentation. It is exactly the counterpart of the com- 

 mon sea species. The Enteromorpha intestinalis, with 



