94 COMMON SEAWEEDS. 



little lady in a rock -pool, " Plocamium ! " "We make a 

 rush for that mass of crimson weed rolled in by a great 

 wave — ^ Plocamium V We greedily clutch the float- 

 ing rosy fronds as we push aside the heavy Fucus in a 

 deep rock-pool — "Plocamium!" And then, when the 

 album is overlooked, how we gaze down the page that 

 is filled with the graceful, rich, bright red Plocamium, 

 remembering the sunny shore where it was gathered ! 



"Crimson weeds which spreading flow, 

 Of lie like pictures on the sand below, 

 With all these bright red pebbles that the sun 

 Through the small waves so softly shines upon." 



Look at it closely with a pocket lens : you will see 

 on some plants the red berry called favellce, on others 

 a kind of fructification we have not yet described — 

 little trefoils, deeply crimson, scattered thickly amidst 

 the comb-like branchlets. 



You will not surely be content with this superficial 

 examination. Take a little spray of Plocamium with 

 these trefoils, called stichidia, put it under the micro- 

 scope with the necessary thin cover and drop of water, 

 and you will see a beautiful structure as of fine net over 

 rose-coloured substance, and in each division of the 

 trefoil numerous tetraspores imbedded. The sight 

 will repay all trouble, and again and again you will 

 look, and call others to see. 



This lovely Plocamium is abundant everywhere, on 

 the stormy coast of Cape Horn, on the sunny shores 

 of New Zealand, under the tropical sky of Brazil, 

 and equally healthy and bappy on the rocks of the 

 cold Baltic Sea, and in the soft sea of the Channel 

 Islands, where, in truth, it partakes of the softness, 

 our island specimens being very bright and flexible, 



