158 



SEA-WEEDS. 



among the red series of sea- weeds. Our figure 

 represents this plant, which is covered with a cre- 

 taceous substance, so as 

 to look more like some of 

 our zoophytes, as the sea- 

 fans and other corals. It 

 is only of late years that 

 this production has been 

 well understood to belong 

 to the vegetable kingdom. 

 Ellis ascertained, that like 

 the corals it effervesced if 

 vinegar was poured upon 

 it; but the entire absence 

 of polypes, or of any indi- 

 cation of animal life; and 

 the fact of its yielding 

 sporules, contained in re- 

 ceptacles like those of the 

 red sea- weeds, mark its 

 vegetable nature. We find 

 it sometimes covering the base or sides of rocky 

 pools with its pale lilac, or pink, or ash-coloured 

 sprays ; or its tufts are blown about by the winds 

 on the shore till they lodge themselves in some 

 nook, and then bleach to an ivory whiteness. If 

 the plant is immersed in fresh water, it imme- 

 diately becomes of a pink or bright orange-colour. 

 There are several other species of the jointed 

 corallines on our shores, but they are at present 

 imperfectly defined, and the one here named is the 

 most general. 



Many of our rocks are quite green with some of 

 the Confervas tribe, which grow on them in such 

 profusion as to render them so slippery that we 



