SEA-WEEDS. 121 



Alaria (Alaria esculenta), a plant which, though 

 not common on all our coasts, yet on some, as 

 the shores of Durham and Northumberland and 

 Scotland, is abundant, and is found, though 

 rarely, on some southern shores of England. It is 

 indeed both general and plentiful on those parts 

 of our isle washed by the Northern Pacific and 

 Atlantic oceans ; but wherever it flourishes it 

 usually grows in deep water. Many people of 

 the northern countries of Europe use this plant as 

 food, and the Irish and Scottish peasants gather it 

 from the rocks, and seem to eat it with great relish. 

 Its frond is a long green leaf, but it may be dis- 

 tinguished from the oar-weeds by the midrib or 

 vein up its middle. It has, besides, on its stem a 

 number of slender leaflets from two to seven 

 inches long, and it is these leaflets and the midrib 

 which are eaten. We must not, however, expect 

 to find the leaflets in its young state, as they are 

 often not developed until the plant is a yard long. 

 This sea- weed is of a thin substance, and of a pale 

 yellowish green, and it sometimes attains a length 

 of twenty feet, but we cannot find a perfect speci- 

 men, as the end of the frond is sure to be torn by 

 the action of the waves upon its somewhat frail 

 texture. Dr. Johnston remarks, that a botanist 

 found on the coast of Northumberland a variety 

 of this sea-weed, with so broad a frond that it 

 reminded him of the leaf of a plantain-tree ; while 

 in another variety of the same coast, the frond was 

 no wider than a common ribbon. It is called 

 Badderlocks or Hen-ware in Scotland, and has 

 also in the Scottish isles the name of Honey-ware, 

 and in Ireland that of Murlins. Sir J. E. Smith 

 remarks, that this sea- weed has, when first tasted, a 



