IV. INTRODUCTIOK. 29 



In gathering Alga3 from tlieir native places, the ichole plant should be plucked 

 from the very base, and if there be an obvious root, it should be left attached. 

 Young collectors are apt to pluck branches or mere scraps of the larger Algte, which 

 often afford no just notion of the mode of growth or natural habit of the plant 

 from which they have been snatched, and are often insufficient for the first purpose 

 of a specimen^ that of ascertaining the plant to which it belongs. In many of the 

 leafy Fucoid plants, (Sargassa^ &c.) the leaves that grow on the lower and on the 

 upper branches are quite different, and were a lower and an upper branch plucked 

 from the same root, they might be so dissimilar as to pass for portions of different 

 species. It is very necessary, therefore, to gather, when it can be done, the icTiole 

 plant, including the root. It is quite true that the large kinds may be judiciously 

 divided ; but the young collector had better aim at selecting moderately sized 

 specimens of the entire plant, than attempt the division of large specimens, unless 

 he keep in view this maxim : every botanical specimen should be an epitome of the 

 essential marks of a species. 



Several duplicate specimens of every kind should always be preserved, and par- 

 ticularly where the species is a variable one. Very many Alga3 vary in the compa- 

 rative breadth of the leaves, and in the degree of branching of the stems ; and 

 when such varieties are noticed, a considerable series of specimens is often requisite 

 to connect a broad and a narrow form of the same species. A neglect of this care 

 leads to endless mistakes in the after work of identification of species, and has been 

 the cause of burdening our systems with a troublesome number of synonymes. 



Where it is the collector's object to pi'eserve Alga3 in the least troublesome man- 

 ner, and in a rough state, to be afterwards laid out and prepared for pressing at 

 leisure, the specimens fresh from the sea are to be spread out and left to dry in an 

 airy, but not too sunny, situation. They are not to be washed or rinsed in fresh 

 water, nor is their natural moisture to l)e squeezed from them. The more loosely 

 and thinly they are spread out the better, and in dry weather they will be sufficiently 

 dry after a few hours' exposure to allow of packing. In a damp state of the atmos- 

 phere the drying process will occujiy some days. No other preparation is needed, 

 and they may be loosely packed in paper bags or boxes, a ticket of the exact locality 

 being affixed to each parcel. Such specimens will shrink very considerably in 

 drying, and most will have changed colour more or less, and the bundle will have 

 become very unsightly ; nevertheless, if thoroughly dried, to prevent mouldiness or 

 heating, and packed loosely, such specimens will continue for a long time in a per- 

 fectly sound state ; and on being re-moistened and properly pressed, will make 

 excellent cabinet specimens. 



It is very much better, when drying Algaa in this rough manner, not to wash 

 them in fresh water, because the salt they contain serves to keep them in a pliable 

 state, and causes them to imbibe water more readily on re-immersion. All large 

 and coarse growing Alga3 may be put up in this manner, and afterwards, at leisure, 

 prepared for the herbarium by washing, steeping, pressing, and drying between 

 folds of soft paper, in the same way that land plants are pressed and dried. But 

 with the membranous and gelatinous kinds, a different method must be adopted. 



The smaller and more delicate Algje must be prepared for the herbarium as 



