Ser. Melanospeeme^e. Yam. Chordariece. 



Plate CLXXVI. 



LEATHESIA BERKELEYI, Harv. 



Gen. Char. Frond globose or lobecl, fleshy, composed of jointed, colourless, 

 dichotomous filaments, issuing from a central point; their apices, 

 which constitute a fleshy coating to the frond, coloured and tufted. 

 Fructification ; oval spores, attached to the coloured tips of the fila- 

 ments. Leathesia [Gray), — in honour of the Eev. Mr. Leathes, a 

 British naturalist. 



Leathesia Berkeley i : fronds dark brown, depressed, fleshy, solid ; fila- 

 ments densely packed. 



CHiETOPHORA Berkeleyi, Grev. in Berk. Gl. Alg. t. 1. fig. 2. Harv. in Hook. 

 Br. Fl. vol. ii. p. 390. Wyatt, Alg. Damn. no. 231. Harv. Man. p. 123. 



Hab. On submarine rocks, between tide marks ; exposed at low water. 

 Annual. Summer. Torquay, Rev. M. J. Berkeley. Tor Abbey rocks, 

 Mrs. Wyatt. Bocks at Ki'lkee, Co. Clare (1833); Miltown Malbay; 

 and Yalentia, Kerry, W. H. H. 



Geogr. Distr. South of England and West of Ireland. 



Descr. Fronds gregarious, one or two inches in diameter, from a quarter to half 

 an inch in thickness, convex, but depressed, irregular in form, dark brown, 

 fleshy, soft, somewhat elastic, not gelatinous to the touch, solid at all 

 periods of its growth. Filaments very densely packed, dichotomous, 

 composed of three kinds of cells ; the cells of the lower part cylindrical or 

 slightly pyriform, several times longer than their diameter ; those of the 

 middle portion bead-like, oval, partially coloured ; those of the terminal 

 branchlets, which are irregularly branched and densely compacted together, 

 very short and full of dark-olive endochrome. Fruit unknown. In drying, 

 the plant shrinks considerably, and partially adheres to paper. 



A small plant, more curious than beautiful, first noticed by 

 the Rev. M. J. Berkeley on rocks at Torquay, from which loca- 

 lity I have received specimens gathered by Mrs. Griffiths and 

 Mrs. Wyatt. On the west coast of Ireland it is plentiful in 

 several places and probably is pretty generally distributed along 

 our shores, being overlooked on account of its being often nearly 

 of the colour of the rock on which it grows, and resembling, in 

 its fleshy appearance and feel, the collapsed body of the common 

 Actinia. The Irish specimens (from which, in a living state, our 

 figure is taken) appear to be identical with those published h\ 

 Mrs. Wyatt, and agree very well with the description of the 



