Ser. Mel£NOSPERMEJ£. Fani. Ectocarpece. 



Plate CXLIX. 



SPHACELARIA FUSCA, Ag. 



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

 rarely simple or subdichotomous. Apices of the branches distended, 

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

 tical utricles (or spores), borne on the ramuli. Sphacelaria (Lynglj.), 

 — from cr(f)aK€\os, gangrene, alluding to the withered tips of the 

 branches. 



Sphacelaria fusca ; filaments densely tufted, capillary, brown, distantly 

 and irregularly branched ; branches long and simple, bearing a few 

 clavate or three-forked, minute ramuli ; articulations twice as long as 

 broad, marked by a transverse band ; spores globose. 



Sphacelaria fusca, Ag. Sp. Jig. vol. ii. p. 34. Ilarv. in Hook. Br. Fl. 

 vol. ii. p. 324. Harv. Man. p. 38. 



Conferva fusca, Huds. FL Aug. p. 602. With. vol. iv. p. 141. Dillw. Conf. 

 t. 95. 



Hab. On rocks and stones, between tide marks. Very rare. Anglesea, 

 Rev. Hugh Davies. Newton Nottage, Glamorgan, Mr. W. W. Young. 

 Worms Head, and other places in Gower, Mr. Dillwyn. Sitlmouth, 

 Mrs. Griffiths. St. Michael's Mount, Cornwall, Mr. lialfs. 



Geogr. Distil Shores of Wales and South of England. 



Descr. Fronds one to two inches high, forming dense pencillate tufts, very 

 slender, irregularly branched in an alternate or spuriously dichotomous 

 manner ; branches often secund, very erect, long and simple, of equal dia- 

 meter throughout. Ramuli very few, scattered, minute, attenuate at the 

 base, club-shaped, or furnished immediately below the apex with three, 

 divergent, thorn-like, somewhat horizontal processes. Articulations about 

 twice as long as broad, composed of several cells, and marked with a brown 

 transverse band in the centre. Spores, according to Dillwyn, globose, 

 scattered, sometimes stalked. Substance rigid, not adhering to paper. 

 Colour a dark chesnut brown. 



Dillwyn, on whose authority the Sphacelaria fusca chiefly 

 rests, gives several stations for it, on the coast of Wales, where 

 it would seem to be pretty common. But except a single speci- 

 men sent to me several years ago by .Mrs. Griffiths, and another 

 more recently received from Mr. Half's, I have seen nothing of 

 the plant ; nor am 1 aware of any other author having found it. 

 [t may or may not be the Conferva fusca of Hudson, whose 



