of the Genus Fungia. 495 
would, if unattached, be exposed to great injury even by a slight 
agitation of the water. 
I have also to remark upon this fact, that the Fungie while 
attached agree in every respect with Lamarck’s genus Caryo- 
phyllia, more especially in their early state, when the radiating 
plates are first developed. At this time their upper discs are 
scarcely larger than the stem, but they soon begin to spread and 
show indications of their characteristic form. 
There are not unfrequently instances of smaller individuals 
remaining fixed to large ones in a living state, and such speci- 
mens are not unfrequent in collections at corals ; but in all such 
cases that I have seen, the younger ones are attached to the 
under side of the old one, and I believe them to be cases of 
accidental attachment. | 
I consider the specimens found at Tahiti, which are figured 
in the accompanying plate, to belong to Lamarck's species 
of Fungia agariciformis, of which there appear to be many va- 
rieties. ‘These have closer plates than those from Sincapore, 
and smaller serratures along their edges. 
In the Paumotus, which are principally coral reef islands 
inclosing a lagoon studded with smaller reefs, I met with a spe- 
cies which I have not observed elsewhere, and do not remember 
to have seen figured in any work on natural history. One is re- 
presented in Tas. xxxii. Fig. 6. a, b. The coral is of an ovate 
form, flatter in proportion than F. agariciformis, and thicker in 
substance, but the lamellze are much thinner and more numerous. 
As I believe that these characters will prove : sufficient to consti- 
tute a distinct species, I propose to call it Fungia Paumotensis. 
The Fungia limacina occurred frequently among the Society 
Islands, but I did not find it in its young and attached state. 
The figures represented in the accompanying plate are all taken 
from specimens collected in the voyage above mentioned, 
In Ellis’s Zoophytes (page 146.) is the following passage, 
VOL. XVI. 35 quoted 
