ARCTIC SEAWEEDS 75 



It was impossible with the limited time at our 

 disposal to obtain a representative collection of the 

 seaweeds that occur among the rocks or on sandy 

 beaches. The number of different kinds was com- 

 paratively small and the majority were familiar. 

 Floating on the waters of the Davis Strait, the 

 Vaigat, and elsewhere, and washed up on the 

 shore, were innumerable Laminarias which had 

 been torn from rocks below tide-level. The genus 

 Laminaria includes large brown seaweeds that are 

 common objects on our coasts, especially those 

 with long flat ribbons or broader flattened ex- 

 pansions, like great leaves deeply cut into finger- 

 like lobes, attached to the surface of submerged 

 rocks by tufts of strong holdfasts at the base of 

 long stems. The Greenland seas are characterised 

 by the abundance and large size of these marine 

 plants. A fairly large specimen of one of the 

 commoner forms (Laminaria longicruris) is shown 

 in the photograph taken at Godthaab (Fig. 33); 

 the broad ribbon-like frond has strongly crinkled 

 edges and, including the supporting flexible stem, 

 it reached a length of several yards. 



It has already been pointed out that a comparison 

 of many of the plants obtained from the rocks in 

 Greenland, more especially from Cretaceous strata, 

 with plants which still exist in other parts of the 

 world compels the inference that the Arctic vege- 

 tation of many million years ago resembled very 

 closely, at least in some of its constituents, that of 

 tropical or sub-tropical regions to-day. As we scan 

 the impressions of leaves and twigs on the surface 



