292 Phillips. — On the Development of 
No other writers, as far as I am aware, describe the structure 
in detail. As Polysiphonia is the genus oftenest selected for 
examination as a convenient type of the Florideae, it is an 
additional reason for submitting a more detailed description 
of the procarps than has yet appeared. 
Rhodomela subfusca (Woodw.). Ag. 
Figs, i, 2 , 3 , 4 . 
This Alga is recorded in Holmes and Batters list (12) as 
occurring in all the fourteen districts into which they mark out 
the British coast The specimens which I have examined were 
collected on the south coast of Anglesey, where the plant 
presents a peculiarity of habit to which Harvey makes no 
reference, but which reminds one of the description given by 
Kj ell man (13) for his new species Rhodomela virgata. It is 
a perennial plant, but is severely cut down in the autumn 
to a few of its main axes, chiefly I believe owing to the 
depredations of molluscs which seem to find its finer ramifi- 
cations an agreeable food. Early in the spring plants thus 
reduced bud out irregularly a large number of new branches, 
reminding one of the behaviour of a polled or, rather, a severely- 
pruned willow or lime. These branches invariably bear in 
their earlier stages reproductive organs, and I have collected 
specimens with cystocarps, antheridia, and tetraspores re- 
spectively. The branches bearing cystocarps are minute 
corymbose tufts, densely covered with procarps in all stages 
of development. While yet the branch is hardly a millimetre 
in length and breadth, the lower cystocarps are apparently 
mature, containing a few well-developed carpospores. Most 
of these procarps, as maybe thought, do not become fertilized, 
and the procarpial branches then proliferate into vegetative 
shoots of the ordinary pattern. Larger branches bearing 
cystocarps, as figured by Harvey, I have not yet collected. 
These small branches afford excellent material for the study 
of the development of the cystocarp, and it is from an ex- 
amination of them that the following description was obtained. 
