FIRST DIVISION OP PLANTS. 



185 



by the name of Lucky Minn/s lines, and in Eng- 

 land of sea lace, see cut, fig. a. Lightfoot mentions 



a. Sea Catgut, cliorda filum; b, Himanthalia Lorea. 



that the fi-onds, skinned when half dry and 

 twisted, acquire so considerable a degree of 

 strength and toughness, that the highlanders 

 sometimes use them for fishing lines. In Scalpa 

 bay, near Kirkwall in Orkney, says Dr Neill, we 

 have sailed thi'ough meadows of it in a pinnace 

 not without some difiiculty, where the water 

 was between three and fom- fathoms deep, and 

 where of course the waving weeds must at least 

 have been fi'om twenty to thirty feet long. The 

 various species of sea tangle, as laminaria digi- 

 tata and bulbosa, are more robust, the former 

 having a stalk as thick and as long as a stout 

 walking stick, and a large flat many-cleft frond 

 at the summit. It is a social species, grows 

 erect in the water, and reminds the spectator of 

 a palm-like tropical forest. The L. bulbosa has 

 sometimes so large a head that a single plant is 

 as much as a man can carry. It is in the south- 

 em hemisphere, however, that we must look for 

 the most wonderful examples of marine vegeta- 

 tion. The lessonia fuscescens, described by 

 Borey de St Vincent, is twenty-five or thirty 

 feet high, and has a trunk often as thick as a 

 man's thigh, which divides into numerous 

 branches, each terminated by a lanceolated frond. 

 The laminaria buccinalis of the Cape of Good 

 Hope is much larger than our common tangle, 

 and is furnished with a hollow stem, which the 

 natives convert into a kind of horn, whence it 

 has acquired the name of trumpet weed. The 

 fucus gigantcBus of Solander, or kelp, as it grows 

 on the shores of Terra del Fuego, is thus de- 

 scribed by Mr Darwin : " This plant grows on 

 every rock from low water to a great depth, both 

 on the outer coast and within the channel. I 

 believe, during the voyages of the Adventurer 



and Beagle, not one rock near the surface was 

 discovered which was not buoyed up by this 

 floating weed. The good service it thus affords 

 to vessels navigating near this stormy land is 

 evident, and it certainly has saved many a one 

 fi'om being wrecked. I know few things more 

 surprising than to see this plant growing and 

 flourisliing amidst those great breakers of the 

 western ocean, which no .mass of rock, let it be 

 ever so hard, can long resist. The stem is round, 

 shining, and smooth, and seldom has a diameter 

 of so much as an inch. A few taken together 

 are sufficiently strong to support the weight of 

 the large loose stones to which, in the inland 

 channels, they grow attached ; and some of these 

 stones are so heavy, that when drawn to the sur- 

 face they can scarcely be lifted into a boat by 

 one person." Captain Cook, in his second voy- 

 age, says, that at Kirguelen land some of this 

 weed is of a most enormous length, though the 

 stem is not much thicker than a man's thumb. 

 I have mentioned that on some of the shoals 

 upon which it grows we did not strike ground 

 with a line of twenty-four fathoms. The depth 

 of water, therefore, must have been greater ; and 

 as this weed does not grow in a perpendicular 

 direction, but makes a very acute angle with the 

 bottom, and much of it afterwards spreads many 

 fathoms on the surface of the sea, I am well war- 

 ranted to say, that some of it grows to the length 

 of sixty fathoms and upwards. Certainly, at the 

 Falkland islands, and about TeiTa del Fuego, 

 extensive beds frequently spring up from ten 

 and fifteen fathom water. I do not suppose the 

 stem of any other plant attains so great a length 

 as 360 feet, as thus stated by Captain Cook. Its 

 geographical range is very considerable. It is 

 found from the extreme southern islets, near 

 Cape Horn, as far north on the eastern coast as 

 latitude 43°, and on the western it was tolerably 

 abundant, but far from luxuriant at Chiloe in 

 latitude 42° ; thus having a range of 15° of lati- 

 tude. The number of living creatures of all or- 

 ders whose existence intimately depends on the 

 kelp is wonderful. I can only comjjare these 

 great aquatic forests of the southern hemisphere 

 with the terrestrial ones in the intertropical re- 

 gions. Yet if the latter should be destroyed in 

 any country, I do not believe nearly so many 

 species of animals would perish as under similar 

 circumstances would happen with the kelp. In- 

 dependent of the numerous zoophytes, amidst 

 the leaves of this plant many species of fish live 

 which no where else would find food or shelter. 

 With their destruction the many cormorants, 

 divers, and other fishing birds, the otters, seals, 

 and porpoises, would soon perish also; and 

 lastly, the Fuegiau savage, the miserable lord of 

 this miserable land, would redouble his cannibal 

 feast, decrease in numbers, and perhaps cease to 

 exist. 



