78 COMMON SEAWEEDS. 



central stein, branching out alternately, and feathery 

 with its delicate fibres. Under the microscope we see 

 the crimson tubes, seven of them if we make a trans- 

 verse section, else we see but four : these, seated on 

 the branches and amid the feathery fibres, are pearly 

 white urns, with about five or seven red spore-cases. 

 If we have a branch with tetraspores, then equally 

 lovely is the group of seeds in transparent cells on a 

 stem fringed with little pink fibres. Length, from 

 four to ten inches. 



Poltsiphonia Elongella. — This is another beau- 

 tiful and more rare plant, found at lowest tide, and only 

 in its beauty during spring and summer. It is from 

 two to five inches long, intensely red, much branched ; 

 and if examined with a microscope, the four siphons 

 are concealed by large hexagonal cells, well marked on 

 the surface by transparent lines. The capsules or urns 

 are very large and reticulated or like net, enclosing 

 crimson spores. Pew plants are more variable than 

 this. It is rich and of a delicate rose red in early 

 summer time, but he who seeks it in September would 

 find but a few ragged stems, spiny and bare. 



Although rare, this plant is found at Sidmouth, 

 Dublin, Jersey, Guernsey, and Sark, on the coast of 

 France, and in the Adriatic Sea. 



Poetsiphonia Vaeiegata. — On mud-covered 

 rocks and on Zostera, of purple hue, and from four to 

 eight inches long, in dense tufts passing from a stout 

 stem to filaments of extreme fineness. Three broad 

 parallel veins mark the stem ; but on making a trans- 



