240 BULLETIN 75, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



wider than long; all the under arm plates are well separated from 

 each other, and the side arm plates nearly or quite meet between 

 them. The lower surface of the arm is, like the mouth parts, covered 

 by a skin which obscures the outlines of the plates and makes it very 

 hard to see the sutures. Side arm plates low but rather long, meeting 

 below but not above; each plate carries five short, thick, smooth, blunt 

 spines, of which the uppermost is longest, and slightly exceeds a joint. 

 Tentacle pores minute; tentacle scales, none; the pores are protected 

 by the lower end of the arm spine ridge and the spines which it bears. 

 Color (dried from alcohol), reddish, yellowish, or grayish-brown. 



Localities. Albatross station 5018, off Saghalin, lat. 46 41' 30" N. ; 

 long. 143 57' 40" E., 100 fathoms, brown mud, black stones, peb- 

 bles, bottom temperature 30.4, 2 specimens; station 5037, off the 

 Hokkaido, lat. 42 2' 40" N. ;. long. 142 33' 20" E., 175 to 349 fath- 

 oms, bottom temperature 37.9, 2 specimens; station 5049, off 

 Kinkwa San Light, lat. 38 12' N. ; long. 142 2' E., 182 fathoms, dark 

 gray sand, broken shells, foraminifera, bottom temperature 37.8, 9 

 specimens. Bathymetrical range, 100 to 349 fathoms. Temperature 

 range 37.9 to 30.4. Thirteen specimens. 



Type. Cat. No. 25738, U.S.N.M., from station 5018. 



Although this species is related to 0. scorteus Lyman it differs so 

 much in its larger upper and under arm plates, its shorter arms, and 

 its more slender, less blunt, arm spines, that the two can not be con- 

 fused. Many of the specimens from station 5049 are clinging tightly 

 to starfishes (Henricia) ; one starfish, only 42 mm. from tip to tip, is 

 tightly grasped over the disk and base of the arms by three speci- 

 mens of Ophiolebes. It would be interesting to know whether this is 

 a normal or accidental association. Aside from the differences in 

 color the chief individual diversity is shown in the amount of exposure 

 of the radial shields; they are sometimes visible for nearly their 

 whole length, but in the type they are wholly concealed and other 

 specimens are intermediate. 



OPHIOLEBES BRACHYGNATHA, new species.a 



Disk 10 mm. in diameter; arms about 40 mm. long. Disk covered 

 by numerous rough, low, pointed stumps. Radial shields more or less 

 exposed, long, very narrow, parallel, and widely separated. Upper 

 arm plates tetragonal, with distal side somewhat curved, and much 

 longer than proximal; they are well separated and between them ap- 

 pear squarish supplementary plates of much smaller size. Inter- 

 brachial spaces below much like disk above, but scaling shows more 

 distinctly. Genital slits short but wide. Oral shields small, rhombic, 

 wider than long. Adoral plates rather large, curved, hardly meeting 



a>Bpa%u, signifying short, and pjadof, signifying jaw, in reference to the unusually 

 short, wide jaws. 



