Cryptogams or Flowerless Plants . 
149 
Natural Order 
ALGZE. Tab. 109. 
D iagnosis. —Cellular plants growing in salt or fresh water or upon damp 
surfaces; usually either some shade of green, olive, or red : very varied in 
form. Reproduced by division or by the liberation of motile portions of the 
cell-contents ; or from spores resulting from the mingling of the contents of 
different cells, or by contact of antherozoids. 
Distribution. —Generally dispersed around the shores and in the inland waters of each quarter 
of the Globe; the Red and Olive coloured Algae more numerous in the North and South 
Temperate zones. Some species occur floating in the open sea, as the Gulf-weed (Sargassum bacci- 
ferum ) found in enormous quantity in an eddy of the Atlantic to the west of the Azores. Macrocystis 
pyrifera , a species of the Southern and Antarctic Oceans, grows-to a length of several hundred feet 
This large Natural Order may be conveniently divided into three principal Sub-orders, primarily 
distinguished by the colour of the thallus :— 
I. Melanospermeze or Fucoideze. —Marine species : usually olive-green or brown. 
II. Rhodospermeze or Florideze. —Marine species : usually some shade of red, passing into 
purple or greenish red. 
III. Chlorosperme^e or Confervoideze. —Marine or fresh-water : usually distinctly green, rarely 
reddish. 
