506 SPOROCHXACEAE. 



branches and the lateral branchlets each end in a subglobose or pyriform 

 enlargement bearing a dense tuft of delicate filaments. The lateral tuft-bear- 

 ing enlargements are sessile in the younger parts, but a stalk for each develops 

 and lengthens with age until the plant is terminated and fringed by a great 

 number of small brush-like structures. The enlargements also elongate with 

 age and together with the stalks form club-shaped ramuli i inch or more long 

 in the older parts, finally becoming naked by the disappearance of the crown 

 of filaments. When the living plant is suspended in the water and properly 

 lighted the terminal tufts appear luminous and iridescent, the whole sug- 

 gesting some sort of miniature candelabrum of small torches. S. BolJeanus was 

 originally described from the Canary. Islands, but has since been reported 

 from Porto Rico. (Phyc. Bor.-Am. £174.) 



Family TILOPTERIDACEAE. 



Heterospora Vidovichii (Menegh.) Kuck. has been reported as occurring 

 on the walls of the inlet near the Hotel Frascati [Phyc. Bor.-Am. £0^6, as 

 Haplospora Vidovichii (Menegh.) Bornet]. It forms long tufts of delicate 

 brownish green threads. Heterospora resembles Ectocarpus in general habit, 

 but differs in mode of reproduction. H. Vidovichii was first described from 

 the Adriatic Sea. 



Family FUCACEAE. 



Ascophyllum nodosum (L.) LeJolis, one of the commonest rockweeds of 

 north-temperate coasts, has been found floating in Bermudian waters, by Collins. 



Turbinaria tricostata E. S. Barton, which is perhaps not always distinct 

 from Turhinaria turbinata (Xi.) Kusatze (T. trialata Klitz.), grows on surge- 

 swept rocks near the low- water mark or in low tide-pools on the South Shore, 

 as at Hungry Bay. Its ultimate branches are peltate or subturbinate, about 

 half an inch long, consisting of a suborbicular dentate-margined terminal ex- 

 pansion supported by a 3-winged or 3-angled stalk. (Phyc. Bor.-Am. 1877.) 



Sargassum natans (L.) Meyen [S. hacciferum (Turn.) Ag.], the Gulf 

 Weed, is common, washed ashore, especially on South Beach. The species of 

 Sargassum have a thallus that is differentiated into parts resembling the stem 

 and leaves of the higher plants and most of them have a branching basal 

 holdfast suggesting roots, but the present species is known only in a free- 

 floating or pelagic condition and is destitute of a holdfast. It is, however, 

 doubtless derived as a species, if not as individuals, from attached forms that 

 are known under another specific name or possibly under two or more specific 

 names. Its alliances seem to be with attached plants known as Sargassum 

 Filipendula, S. foliosissimum, or S. vulgare. In the genus Sargassum there 

 are, in the mature state, stalked air-vesicles of about the size of a pea or 

 often smaller. The leaf -like parts are more or less distinctly unicostate and 

 in most species show to the naked eye or under a hand lens small dark spots 

 or pits (cryptostomata) from which minute hairs arise. In S. natans such 

 spots are wanting or few and obscure. (Phyc. Bor.-Am. 2180.) 



