150 SEA -WEEDS. 



is sometimes roasted by them in the frying-pan 

 and eaten. Dr. Greville thinks that its reputa- 

 tion as an article of food, has arisen from its 

 having been very generally mistaken for the true 

 dulse, the Rhodomenia palmata. It is indeed much 

 like that plant in colour, being of a deep blood-red, 

 which as it grows older, changes to green or dingy 

 white. It often becomes much darker in drying. 

 It is a fleshy thick leaf, without any veins, flat, 

 and the upper part somewhat egg-shaped, but 

 narrowing off into a slender stem at the base. It 

 is seldom in a whole state when the waves dash it 

 on the shore, but is often split to the very base 

 into several pieces, for its succulence renders it 

 less flexible than many sea-weeds, and less able 

 to resist the force of the waves. It is a favourite 

 food, too, of the crabs and other living creatures of 

 the deep ; so that its edges are often bitten, and 

 large holes made in its frond by the depredations 

 which they have committed; and when full of 

 water, it bends by its own weight. 



This sea- weed grows on rocks in the sea, usually 

 near low-water mark, and is one of our autumnal 

 plants. It is frequent on our southern coasts, 

 and also on the western coast of Scotland, but is 

 less general than the true dulse. It is very pretty 

 when young, as the fronds grow in tufts. When 

 laid to macerate in water, it tinges the liquid with 

 a fine purple tint ; and an excellent lake colour 

 has been procured from an infusion of the plant 

 assisted by alum. 



That firm, almost horny, sea-weed, the Horny 

 Gelidium (Gelidium corneum), of a dark red or 

 even blackish-purple colour, is common on most 

 rocky coasts of Great Britain and Ireland, growing 



