THE SARGASSO SEA. 337 



the Southern part of the great Equatorial streams to the South of it, but 

 it is higher than that of the Current which sets S.E. and South between 

 the Azores and Spain, and lower than that of the surface of the Gulf of 

 Mexico and the early course of the Gulf Stream. It may, therefore, be 

 considered that it approximates to the water-climate of the bottom near 

 the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, that of the sea around the Bahamas, &c., 

 where it is known that this weed grows naturally. 



(293.) The Sargasso or Gulf-weed, which is the peculiar characteristic 

 of this area, is one of the few plants, aquatic or terrestrial, which will live 

 and flourish when separated from its native stem. Its appearance is too 

 well known to require any detail. The sea was called Sargagao by the 

 early Portuguese navigators, from the weed bearing berries like grapes, 

 "sarga." This term has thus been corrupted into Sargasso, and been 

 applied to the plant itself instead of the place it grows on. There are 

 more than one species of it known to botanists, as sargassum vulgare, &c., 

 distinguished from each other by the form of the leaves and the fructifica- 

 tion. These different species are more or less abundant in different localities. 

 It is frequently called fumis nata7is—&0Sbtmg sea-weed; and is known to 

 sailors as gulf -weed, that famous stream being always more or less marked 

 with it. 



(294.) The old story of Columbus, wno had much difficulty with his men, 

 when they declared that even the sea changed its nature into terrestrial 

 to prevent his proceeding on his discovery voyage to America, has been 

 oft repeated. In his account he stated that " sometimes the weed comes 

 in such compact masses as to cause the sea to look like a coagulated mass." 



The sea is commonly studded over, like an inundated meadow, with the 

 bushes, which are in some places very abundant, and in others more dis- 

 persed. If we imagine the surface of a wide extended moor, covered 

 with water, the furze and heath bushes would appear something like the 

 clusters of fucus scattered over the thickest part of this sea. 



The fructification of all sea-weeds is peculiar, but they require a fixed 

 basis to vegetate. Although apparently flourishing in vast areas in the 

 Sargasso Sea, they can only be looked on as cut flowers rather than as 

 complete plants, although their constitution enables them to live a long 

 period without being fixed to their parent rock like most other algae. They 

 are found in every state of decay, and when old they become covered with 

 minute and beautiful parasitic growths, which deserve much attention by 

 those who have the leisure and taste to examine them, especially with the 

 microscope, which in this region reveals a vast and little known world. 

 Besides this, too, the tufts afford protection and shelter to a vast quantity 

 and variety of minute fishes, crabs, and other Crustacea and animalcula?, 

 which will afford an inexhaustible fund of interest to the observer. 

 Naturally enough, there is a limit to its separate existence, and when 

 subjected to any change of temperature, or difference of locality unsuitable, 

 by a continuous wind or current, large areas become decayed, die, and sink 

 to the bottom, to be renewed by the continual fresh importations from the 

 Gulf of Mexico. 



It is sometimes drifted on to the shores of the British Isles and Western 



N.A. 0. 44 



