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furnished with a stipes as thick as fine pack-thread, cylindrical and
filiform, very variable in regai'd to length, more or less divided in an
irregularly dichotomous manner, the branches gradually expanding
into flat nerveless oblong-wedge-shaped simple or forked fi’ondlets, two
to four lines in width, the segments sometimes acute, but more generally
somewhat truncate and proliferous at the end, the young shoots
rising with a short cylindrical foot-stalk, and then dilating like the parent
frond, and so on for several series. Instead of being dichotomous,
the stem is sometimes beset towards its summit with a number
of unequal branches, crowded together, and almost distichous. The
branches in some cases begin to expand into the frondlet immediately,
but, in others, they remain iiliform for one or two inches, or even to
their very extremity. Fructification, spherical dark red capsules
about twice the size of poppy-seed, sessile at the apices of the frond.
Substance cartilaginous, rather thin, but opake in the frond. Colour
a deep dull purplish-red, in the young shoots pink, and somewhat
transparent ; becoming greenish, and at length white in decay. It
does not adhere to paper in drying, and scarcely changes colour.
The var. g is membranaceous, of a beautiful rose colour, darker
after having been dried, and frequently having a roundish dark red
spot, above a line broad in the disk of the frond, composed of a
dense mass of vertical moniliform filaments (nemathecia, Ag.) which
is at length deciduous, leaving a whitish scar behind. This variety
grows in erect tufts, about two inches in height : the oblong leaf is
about three lines wide and an inch long.
The capsules of this plant are exceedingly curious they appear to
be destitute of any external membrane, and to consist of a spongy substance
composed of a thick mass of compound granules in radiating lines,
while the centre is occupied by similar granules, only considerably larger,
and in no arrangement. In the young state, the external portion seems
to be composed of jointed filaments, but in a ripe capsule their real
nature is sufficiently perceptible. The granules of this part are roundish,
but at the same time angular, and made up of three or four smaller
ones, the whole connected together so as to form an intei-rupted filament.
In its fructification, therefore, it is evident this plant differs
from its congeners, as well as in its more decided red colour. At
Sidmouth I had an opportunity of tracing the var. g from its usual
simple form, until it became repeatedly proliferous, more cartilaginous
in substance, and deeper in colour; in short, until it became identified
with some states of C. Brodiæi.
Sprengel has somewhat boldly annihilated the species in his edition
of the Species Plantqmm.
Ge n u s X X X V l. PH Y L LO PH O RA , Grev. Tab. XV.
Ge n . Ch a r . Frond cartilaginous or membranaceous, of a
purple rose-red colour, plane, proliferous from the disk,
furnisbed with a more or less imperfect or obscure midrib.
Fructification : 1. Capsules, containing a mass of
minute roundish free seeds ; 2. Sori of simple granules
in little foliaceous processes. (In two species nemathecia
have been observed, b u t no granules.)
Obs. The plants which constitute this genus are arranged by Professor
Agardh, in a distinct section among the Sphærococci. By Lamouroux
three were described as Delesserioe. Two of them, P. vittatus
and pristoides, have a distinctly twofold fructification ; in two others,
P. nervosus and rubens, granules have not been discovered, but in
place of them we find nemathecia at the base of little foliaceous processes
situated on the disk of the frond ; and in the two remaining
species,—doubtful ones—P. seminervis and lactuca, no fructification
whatever has been observed : the form of the frond is mostly oblong
or linear, more or less attenuated at the base, sometimes provided with
a short stem, furnished with a midrib obscurely developed, and generally
disappeai'ing at a short distance from the base, but in all cases
before reaching the summit. Except in P . lactuca and seminervis
(species little understood), the frond is proliferous from the disk. The
root is scutate, sometimes partially fibrous. The colour is quite a different
kind of red from that of the preceding genus, being destitute of
the dull livid hue so common among the Chondri.
The generic name is derived from two Greek words, and signifies
leaf-bearing, in allusion to the proliferous character of the frond.
1. P h y e e o p h o r a r u b e n s . Tab. XV.
f
Stem very short expanding into a linear-wedge-shaped frond, obscurely
ribbed and repeatedly branched with proliferous shoots resem