136 SEA-WEED GARDENS. 



minating fans of our little friends again. Though I 

 instituted careful examinations of the spots indicated 

 at intervals of two or three days, it was almost the 

 last of May hefore I could detect the minute thing 

 springing from the mud in the tepid pool. Others 

 however, soon appeared, and grew fast, so that by the 

 middle of July numerous beds of them were to be 

 found, in which the plants had attained almost their 

 full dimensions, the fronds varying from one to two 

 inches in diameter, Mr. Thompson has endeavoured 

 to propagate this pretty A%a with entire success ; 

 collecting the fronds from their native site, when fully 

 ripe, he scattered them in similar situations all along 

 the shore ; so that now, under Sandsfoot Castle, and 

 on the ledges between this and Byng Cliff, and in a 

 little bight of the rocks below the Nothe, there are 

 what I may call flourishing gardens of the Padina, 

 fully established, and needing no further care for their 

 perpetuity. 



It is a curious and interesting Alga, not only for 

 its singular form, but because of its texture, which is 

 delicately membranous, its colour, which is pale whit- 

 ish olive or drab, marked with numerous concentric 

 bands or zones, its surface, which is covered with a 

 fine whitish deciduous powder, and its circular margin 

 (often split), which is fringed with a line of very minute 

 hairs, set at an angle from the plane of the frond. The 

 sides of the frond frequently curve inward and form 

 scrolls. The specimens will live a good while in the 

 Aquarium : they are somewhat difficult to dislodge in 

 a growing state, owing to the extreme tenuity and 

 tenderness of their point of attachment, and to the 



