IV. 
LAMINARIACEiE. — Nereocystis. 
85 
Hab. Shores of California, Beechey , Coulter, Wilkes , Sfc. Unalaschka and Sitcha, 
Post els and Rupr edit. (v. v. ad C. B. S.) 
Root much branched. Stems from five feet to several hundred feet long, filiform 
or flattish, eventually subdichotomously branched. Leaves lateral, secund along 
the branches, lanceolate, varying much in length and breadth, membranaceous or 
coriaceous, smooth or wrinkled, bordered with slender cilia or subulate teeth ; each 
leaf rising from an air-vessel. Air-vessels as variable in form and size as the leaves, 
globose, ellipsoidal, pear-shaped or fusiform, or long and narrow-club-shaped. 
I fully concur with my friend Dr. Hooker in the view of this species which we 
have jointly taken in another place. {FI. Ant. vol. 2 , p. 461.) We have together 
carefully examined specimens representing most of the forms distinguished as species 
by authors, and still retained by Prof. J. Agarclh ; and each of us, — Dr. Hooker 
very extensively, — has had an opportunity of verifying opinions arrived at in the 
study by observations made from the living plants on the sea-shore ; and we have 
both, independently, arrived at the conclusion that all the forms separated by 
authors are referable to a single, and not very variable species. Many of these 
reputed species may indeed be found growing together on different parts of the same 
stem ; the differences observed being either the result of age, or of a different degree 
of submersion, or other modifying cause. 
II. NEREOCYSTIS, Post, and Rupr. 
Stem filiform, simple, terminating in a club shaped air-vessel, from which springs 
a tuft of dichotomously divided leaves, formed by the continual splitting, from the 
base upwards, of an original, simple, terminal leaf. Root branching. Fructification 
unknown. 
Nereocystis Liitkeana , Post, and Rupr. Illustr. p. 9. t. 8. 9. Endl. Gen. Pl. 3rd 
Suppl.p. 27. J. Ay. Sp. Aly., vol. 1, p. 148. Kiitz. Sp. Aly. p. 584. Fucus Liit- 
keanus, H. Mert. in Linn. 1829 • p. 48. Hook. Bot. Misc. vol. 3 ,p. 3. 
Hab. North West Coast, at Norfolk Sound, Dr. Henry Mertens. (v. s. in Herb. 
T. C. D.) 
I copy the following account of this remarkable plant from the paper of Dr. Henry 
Mertens, its discoverer : — 
“ A root, ramified in the manner of the Laminarias produces a stipes like pack- 
thread, and everywhere of uniform thickness, about two or three feet long, and 
suddenly swelling at the end into a perfectly round, large, bladder-nut. The upper 
portion of this hemispherical body bears a tuft of geminate leaves, mostly rising on 
