Ser. MELANosPERMEiE. Fam. Ceramiea. 



Plate CXLIII. 



SPHACELARIA SERTULARIA, Bomm. 



Gen. Chau. Filaments jointed, rigid, distichously branched, pinnated; 

 rarely simple or subdichotomous. Apices of the branches distended, 

 membranous, containing a dark, granular mass. Fructification ; ellip- 

 ticle utricles (or spores) furnished with a limbus, borne on the ramuli. 

 Sphacelaeia (Lfjngb.), — from o-feKaXos, gangrene, alluding to the 

 withered tips of the branches. 



Sphacelaeia Sertularia; frond slightly shaggy at the base, weak and 

 slender, irregularly branched ; branches somewhat lanceolate or linear 

 horizontally patent, tripinnate; piimse alternate, divaricate; pinnules 

 very patent, multifid ; axils all very obtuse and wide. 



Sphacelahia Sertularia, Bonnern. sec. Lenorm. in Herb. 



Sphacelakia filicina /3. patens, Ilarv. Man. p. 37. 



Hab. Parasitical on various Algse, in from four to fifteen fathoms water. 

 Very rare. Perennial. Brighton Beach, Mr. Borrer. Torbay, 

 and other places on the South Coast, Mrs. Griffiths. Isle of Wight, 

 Miss Kirhpatrick. Jersey, Miss II M. White. Carrickfergus, Mr. 

 M'Calla. Eoundstone Bay, W.II.II. 



Geogr. Distr. Atlantic shores of France, South of England, and Ireland. 



Descr. Fronds about an inch, rarely two inches high, very slender, growing in 

 irregular, somewhat matted patches or tufts, among the branches of other 

 Algae, more or less connected at base by curled brown fibres, more or less 

 regularly pinnate, or somewhat naked below and producing at the apex 

 numerous branches spreading like a fan. Branches linear, linear-fcmceolate. 

 or oblong, closely tripinnate throughout, the pinna? very unequal in length, 

 long and short ones sometimes alternating; at other times most of the cen- 

 tral pinnae are of equal length, those near the top and bottom being much 

 shorter. Pirn/re horizontally patent, alternate, bipinnate below, more or less 

 tripinnate above, the two lowermost pinnae given oil' from the upper side of 

 the rachis before any issue from the lower. Pinnule* issuing at every 

 second joint, horizontally patent or divaricate, pinna to-multind, their ulti- 

 mate divisions linear, obtuse, patent. Articulations about as long as broad, 

 3-4-striaif, the stria 1 less numerous in the younger parts; the ultimate 

 ramuli mono-siphonous. Colour an olive-green. Substance rigid, scarcely 

 adhering to paper. The apices of the branches are frequently much pro- 

 duced, Sphacelate, containing a dark coloured granular mass. 



It is, I allow, with some hesitation that I offer a figure of the 



present plant as anything more than a deep-water variety of 

 SjjJiacclariaJHic'n/a, analogous to somewhat similar variety 

 several other Alga:, individuals of which, when growing at a more 



VOL. II. O 



