Tin: MAKiNi: alg.e of new England. 1G9 



R. SUBFUSCA, A«i. ; Phyc. Brit., Tl. 2G4. 



Exs. — Al^. Am. r>or., Farlow, Anderson & Eaton, No. 55. 



Fronds six inches to a foot and a half lon^', terete, pinnately deconi- 

 IKHind, branches vir^ate, lower branchlets patent, subulate, the upper 

 faseiculatocorynd>ose; tetraspores prominent in subtorulose branchlets; 

 eystocari)s sessile, ovato-g:lobose. 



Var. GRACILIOK, J. A«>-. [lihodomcla gracilis, Ilarv., Ner. Am. Dor., 

 l\irt II, IM. Uc.) 



Fronds slender ; tetrasporic branches distinctly tondose. 



In deep tide-pools and at a depth of several fathoms. 



Throughout our whole limits ; Europe. 



A specios Nvliich varies very much with tlie time of year and the place of j^rowth. 

 It is usually eonnnou in the sprinjjj mouths, when it is often washed ashore, and in th»i 

 summer and autumn it is occasionally found, espt'cially in dredging, in a denuded 

 form, nothinj; remainin*; but the older branches, which are perennial and which give 

 rise the following season to rather delicate new branches. As usually seen on Cape Ann 

 the fronds are short, robust, and dark colored, even in early spritig, while at Wood's 

 Holl and in Long Island Sound the common spring form is mnch attenuated, dehcate, 

 and of a brighter red color, forming the lihodomcla Iiochci of the Nereis. In spite of 

 the ditlerence in aspect, the extreme forms are connected by numerous transitional 

 stages which make it impossible to admit a specific distinction. By Agardli li. Eochei 

 is considered to bo the spring form of the typical Ji. siihfusca, but we are more inclined 

 to regard it as the young of the var. graciUor, which is more common south of Cai)c 

 Cod, the type occurring northward. The species does not adhere well to paper. 



POLYSIPIIOXIA, Grev. 



(From rro'/.vr, many, and (riduv, a tube.) 



Fronds tilamentous or subcompressed, distichously or irregularly 

 branching, formed of a monosiphonous axis and several (i:-20) siphons, 

 often with secondary siphons, and either naked or with a cortical layer 

 of irregular cells, furnished with numerous tufts of hyaline, monosipho- 

 nous, dichotomous filaments; antheridia lanceolate in outline, borne on 

 the dichotomous filaments; tetraspores tripartite, in one, rarely in two, 

 rows, in the slightly altered upper branches ; cystocarps ovato-globose 

 orurceolate; spores pyriform, on short pedicels borne around a basal 

 carpogenic cell. 



The largest genus of /7onrf«'fl', of which more than two hundred species have been 

 described, but not all of which can be consi»lere<l valid. They abound in all i>art3 of 

 the world, especially in warm, shallow waters. .Some are perennial, but the majority 

 are annual and <lisai»pear tluring the winter. They an' «'asily re<-ogni7.ed at sight by 

 the structure of the froiul and the tetraspores, which ar»' almost always in a single row 

 in the u]>per brandies, rarely in a double row, and not in swollen special branches or 

 Btichidia, as in Jiostryrhia, which is nearly n^lateil to I'objHiphonia. The growth is from 

 a single apical cell, from which is formed a monosiph(Uious axis. Hy tangential di- 

 visiuDsof the upi>er cells there i.** formed a number of peripheral cells and a central 



