Fig. 149. CORALLINA SQUAMATA. 
Colour. Purplish or lilac when recent ; varying to pinky or brick-dust red, fading to green 
or milk-white. 
Suhstance. Hard and limy, like coral ; but flexible at the joints ; exceedingly brittle, when dry. 
Character of Frond, Bushy ; tufted ; much branched in thick clumsy joints. Stems simple, 
bearing stiff, straight, upright, mostly opposite branches of sometimes very unequal 
lengths. Branches once or twice re-branched. Branchlets exactly opposite, and of 
regular lengths, giving a feathery outline to each division. Lower joints cylindrical, 
scarcely longer than their breadth ; upper, twice as long ; flatter, wider, and more 
distinctly wedge-shaped than those of C. officinalis ; with sharp, prominent shoulders. 
Branchlets very slender, with acute tips. 
Measurement From 1 to 6 inches high ; rising from an expanded lilac-red crust. 
Fructification. Only one kind known. Clustered strings of spores in urn-shaped or oval 
capsules ; external ; at the tips of the branches, or scattered on the sides. 
Habitat. South coast of England and west of Ireland. On submarine rocks at the extremity 
of low-water mark. Not common. 
Closely resembling C. officinalis, but they may be distinguished by a careful observation of 
the upper joints of the stem and branches ; which in C. sqnamata are “broad and flat, with 
unusually sharp angles.” 
Fig. 150. DELESSERIA ANGUSTISSIMA. 
Colour. Dark-red. 
Substance. Firm ; but membranaceous. 
Character of Frond. Thread-like {filamentous) ; tufted ; excessively branched. Stems 
cylindrical below, compressed above. Branching very irregular ; partly forked 
{dichotomous) ; partly alternate. Branches at one level throughout {distichous) ; of 
unequal lengths ; much divided above, and furnished with numerous forked branchlets. 
Measurement. From 4 to 8 inches long. 
Fructification. Of two kinds. 1. Clustered sjoom in globose capsules; imbedded in the tips 
of the branches, or in small side-branchlets. 2. Tetraspores in groups {sori) either 
in the swollen tips or in narrow side-branchlets. 
Habitat. North of Scotland and east of England. (Filey.) Parasitical on the stems of 
Laminaria digitata. 
Those who have had the opportunity of seeing much of this plant cannot fail to accept 
Dr. Harvey’s judgment, that it is but an extremely narrow variety of Delesseria alata. At 
Filey the most strikingly intermediate specimens are to be found. 
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