46 THE OCEAN. 



contain, many of these plants are highly nutritive, 

 and cattle often feed on them with greediness. One 

 of the species most extensively eaten is that known 

 in Scotland by the name of Dulse {Rhodomenia 

 palmata). It exhibits the appearance of a very 

 thin, membranaceous leaf, irregularly oblong, of a 

 purplish colour, or sometimes rosy-red: there is no 

 rib, but the substance is uniform ; it grows from 

 three inches to a foot in length. Before the in- 

 troduction of tobacco, this leaf was rolled up and 

 chewed in the same manner as the Virginian leaf is 

 at present. It is an important plant to the inhabit- 

 ants of Iceland; they wash it thoroughly in fresh 

 water, and dry it in the air, when it becomes covered 

 with a white powdery substance, which is sweet and 

 palatable; it is then packed in close casks, and pre- 

 served for eating. It is used in this state with 

 fish and butter, or else, by the higher classes, 

 boiled in milk, with the addition of rye-flour. In 

 Kamschatka, a fermented liquor is produced from it. 

 It is extremely common on all our coasts, and being 

 frequently washed on shore, is sought with avidity 

 by the cattle: sheep sometimes go so for in the pur- 

 suit of it at low water as to be drowned by the 

 returning tide. This species, with another which I 

 am about to describe, was, until recently, so much 

 esteemed by our northern countrymen, that it was 

 publicly sold in the cities as an article of regular 

 consumption. The cry of "Buy dulse and tangle," 

 resounded at no very distant period even through 

 the streets of Edinburgh. The latter is the sea-weed, 

 usually called in England the Sea-girdle, and in the 



