Ser. CHLOROSPERMEA. Fam. Confervee. 
Prats CCCXXXITI. 
CONFERVA LITOREA, Harv. 
Gun. Cuar. /ilaments green, attached or floating, unbranched, composed 
of a single series of cells or articulations. /ruit, aggregated granules 
or zoospores, contained in the cells, having, at some period, a proper 
ciliary motion. Conrerva (Plin.),—from conferruminare, to conso- 
lidate: because some of the species were used by the ancients for 
binding up fractured limbs. 
Conrerva /itorea ; filaments thick, rigid, crisped, forming loose, extensive 
bundles of a dull green colour ; articulations once and half as long as 
broad, here and there swollen in pairs and discoloured. 
ConFerva litorea, Harv. Man. ed. 2. p. 208. 
Conrerva linum, Harv. in Hook. Br. Fl. vol. ii. p. 352. Harv. Man. ed. | 
p- 128. Wyatt, Alg. Danm. No. 220. (not of Roth.) 
Has. In salt-water ditches near the coast; in estuaries, and along the 
muddy sea-shore, between tide-marks. “Annual. Summer. Appin, 
Capt. Carmichael. Plymouth, Mrs. Wyatt. Bangor, North Wales, 
Mr. Ralfs. Orkneys, W.H.H. 
Groar. Distr. 
Descr. Filaments three or four inches long or more, about half the diameter of 
C. grea, loosely bundled together in prostrate or floating strata of conside- 
rable extent, and of a pale green colour, becoming darker and duller as 
the season advances. ach filament is irregularly curled and twisted, and 
sometimes angularly bent. The articulations are cylindrical, filled with a 
pale green watery endochrome, and about once and half as long as broad ;, 
and here and there, at irregular intervals, two proximate articulations, 
longer and broader than the rest, form together a spindle-shaped 
swelling, in which a dark-coloured endochrome collects, the mass being 
darkest and densest where the two cells touch each other. This looks like 
the commencement of fructification, but | am unable to say whether a spo- 
rangium is ultimately formed. These dark-coloured double cells are fre- 
quently so numerous that they give the filaments, when examined with a 
pocket lens, a variegated appearance. Suéstance membranaceous, and in 
drying the plant scarcely adheres to paper. 
The above description is intended for the plant commonly 
found in British Herbaria under the name C. Ham, Br. FL, 
VOL. III. 2B 
