of the rays of the sun, its tints become pale and dim.

"The water is calm and still below,

For the winds and waves are absent there,

And the sands are bright as the stars, that glow
In the motionless fields of upper air;

There with its waving blade of green,

The sea-flag streams through the silent water,
And the crimson leaf of the Dulse is seen

To blush like a banner bathed in slaughter."

But I must now describe a few of the seaweeds, more or less common, and some of which you may very likely find upon the beach.

The purple laver* is abundant on most of our coasts. Its fronds, which are of a bluish purple, are extremely thin and membranous; and because they are a little like lutestring, children call them sea-silk. In the south of England, it is pickled and preserved in jars, and when brought to table is eaten with oil and lemon juice. Many persons think the purple laver very nice, but it tastes too much of the sea to suit every palate.

Another common weed is called the sea whiplash. It is thirty or forty feet long, and being really very much like a cord, is twisted by the Highlanders into fishing lines. The long cord or tube of the whip-lash is composed of a thread * Porphyra laciniata. + Chorda filum.

or fillet, twisted round and round in a spiral manner; and when the plant is old, and the outer membrane worn away, you can pull it out just like a corkscrew. This cord is in reality the frond, and is hollow, except every now and then, when it has a little wall or partition across it.

The partitions confine the air in the spaces between, and so act as swimming bladders to increase the buoyancy of the plant.

A. Chorda Filum.

B. Showing its spiral mode of growth.

The whip-lash floats always under the surface

of the water, and in many places forms such extensive sea-meadows, that vessels have great difficulty in making their way through it.

The gulf weed,* about which we read so much in books of travel, is called by sailors the tropical grape, because its berry-like air vessels are supported upon little stalks, something in the shape of a bunch of grapes. It is occasionally driven upon the coast of the Orkney Islands, but its place of growth is between the tropics, where it forms two immense floating islands, that keep always in the same place, and serve as guides to the Spanish pilots.

It was this weed which caused a great deal of trouble and anxiety to Columbus, on his voyage of discovery to the New World. When he came near the Canary Islands, he found the sea so covered with weeds, that it resembled a vast meadow, and in some places, they were so thick as to prevent the vessels from moving. The sailors, who all along had been filled with groundless fears, became more alarmed than ever, and declared they dare not go any further. They fancied they had reached the utmost bounds of the navigable ocean, and that these floating weeds were a warning to them to turn back.

* Sargassum vulgare.

Columbus tried to reason them out of their foolish alarm, and told them the weeds, instead of stopping their progress, ought rather to encourage them to go on, because they were a sure sign that land was not far off. Fortunately for

Columbus, a brisk gale sprang up, almost while he was speaking, and carried the vessels forward. Several birds were seen to hover about the ship,

Gulf-weed.

and direct their flight to the west. The spirits

of the crew revived, and they pushed forward with renewed hope, towards the New World which lay before them.

The Sargassum is found over a wide extent of ocean, but it is called gulf weed, because it was first observed to be very abundant in the Gulf of Mexico. It generally attracts the attention of passengers to and from foreign countries, and the sailors often bottle up some of it, to bring home as a curiosity to their friends. One might imagine, at first sight, that these floating masses of seaweed could be of no use in the middle of the ocean. But they probably support a greater number of living creatures than the richest meadow upon land. They afford food and shelter to millions of Zoophytes, and fishes, many of which are seen playing about, making excursions into the surrounding deep, and then returning to hunt amongst the branches, or to rest upon them as their home.

The tangle or tang of the Scotch, is a very common weed; and though it grows in deep water, you may constantly see it lying on the shore. The frond is from two to twelve feet or more in length, and at the end is slit up into several segments; sometimes the segments unite

Laminaria digitata.