44 
VALONIACEiE. 
formed. Fig. 5. Portion of the capitular filament ; the latter figures more or less 
magnified. 
II. PENICILLUS. Lamarck. 
Root fibrous, much branched, matted. Frond stipitate, dendroid. Stipes erect, 
cylindrical or compressed, incrusted, wholly composed of numerous longitudinal, 
unicellular branching filaments woven together into a compact spongy mass ; and 
crowned with a dense pencil of confer void, articulate ramelli, whose branches are either 
free, or cohere together in fan-shaped laminae, and are invested with a porous pellicle 
of carbonate of lime. 
If Mer-men have beards and shave them, the Algae included in this genus may serve 
as shaving brushes. The root is much branched and its fibres matted together, and 
generally penetrates deeply into the sand in which the plant grows. The stipe is more 
or less coated with carbonate of lime, and composed of a multitude of closely placed 
and densely interwoven longitudinal, unicellular filaments, which send off laterally, 
throughout their length, short, fastigiate, corymbose ramelli, that unite together to 
form a periphery. Thus far we have a structure closely agreeing with that of a Codium. 
But from the apex of this compact, spongy stipe there springs a dense tuft or capitulum, 
composed of dichotomous, articulated, free filaments ; and the whole frond bears a 
striking resemblance to a shaving brush. The habit is similar to that of Chamcedoris , 
from which the spongy, multicellular stipe distinguishes it ; and to Chlorodesmis , which 
differs in having a capitulum formed of unicellular filaments. 
The species naturally arrange themselves in two groups, or sub-genera, which Kiitzing 
has separated ; a separation which is hardly needed, where the species are so few in 
number and so closely related in structure. 
Sect. 1 . Haligraphium, Endl. ( Corallocephalus , Kiitz.) ; branches of the capitulum 
free. 
1. Penicillus dumetosus , Dne. : stipes short, thick, somewhat compressed, velvetty ; 
filaments of the capitulum loosely spreading, ultra-setaceous, flaccid, deep-green ; their 
joints cylindrical, many times as long as broad, equal, obtuse, strongly constricted at 
the nodes. Dne. Cor. p. 97- Nesoea dumetosa , Lamour. Polyp, p. 259. pi. 8 ,fig. 3, 
a. B. Corallocephalus dumetosus , Kiitz. Sp. Alg. p. 506. (Tab. XLIII. A.) 
Hab. Key West and Sand Key, W.H.H. Soldier’s Key, Prof. Tuomey. (v. v.) 
Root, a dense mass of fibres deeply sinking in the sand. Stipes , 1-3 inches long, 
half-inch to nearly an inch in thickness, sometimes rather hollow in the centre, more or 
