erect; bnt sometimes they are arched; and, in a distorted variety occasionally
found, they are bent at right angles in a zigzag manner. In all the lesser
branches and ramuli taper considerably to each end. Tubercles (coccidia)
large, sessile, roundish or subovate, with a subacute nipple, plentifully
scattered over the branches, and containing a mass of minute, ovate spores;
their pericarp composed externally of radiating filaments, internally of
angular cells. Tetraspores minute, imbedded in the surface cells of the
branches, or distinct plants. Colour a pale or deep purple-red, becoming
greenish, and at length white in decay. Substance cartilaginous, flexible,
horny when dry, and very imperfectly adhering to paper.
A variable plant, as its numerous synonymes testify, and yet,
with a little practice, easily recognized among British Algse.
Several exotic species, however, nearly approach it, some of which
ought, perhaps, to be united with it.
By Dr. J. Agardh, in his excellent work on the Algæ of the
Mediterranean, Gracilaria confervoides is placed in the genus
Hypnea. If the differences between the genera Hypnea and
Gracilaria consist, as Agardh declares, more in peculiarities of
natural habit than of definite structural characters, in my opinion,
C. confervoides coincides better with the latter group ; and I am
very unwilling to place it in a different genus from such nearly
allied plants as G. dura and G. compressa. But besides natural
habit, the tetraspores in the true Hypneæ are, I believe, always
annularly divided, like those of Blocamium, and I am not aware
of this being the case in any species of Gracilaria.
Fig. 1. G e a o i l a k i a c o n f b e v o i d e s ;— natural size. 2. Longitudinal semi-
section of a branch. 3. Transverse section of the same. 4. Vertical section
of a tubercle. B. Spores from the same.