PART 5 A MONOGRAPH OF THE EXISTING CRINOIDS 213 



very rocky bottom. They met with fairly similar results close to the Thatcher Rock. 

 Major Lang remarks that it is evident the habitat of this species is strictly circumscribed, 

 in comparatively deep water and among rocks. They never took a single specimen 

 from sandy or shelly bottom. 



On examining the few pieces of seaweed and zoophytes brought up at the same time 

 they were found to be covered with the young pentacrinoids which were principally 

 attached to Bugula and Cellaria. As he wrote, Major Lang had before him a small 

 bottle of alcohol and water in which was a little spray of the latter about two inches in 

 height to which were attached at least 70 specimens in every stage of development from 

 the calcareous bud with its zoophyte-like tentacles to the perfect, but stalked, form; 

 and on a single microscopical glass slide and cell he has mounted as many as a dozen 

 specimens all growing on the same small piece of weed. 



He observes that it is generally stated that both Antedon and Ophiothrix on leaving 

 their native element break themselves into pieces, but his experience does not bear this 

 out. It is true that, as they crawled about the deck in their own peculiar fashion, the 

 Ophiothrix, especially, left an occasional arm behind, but as a rule he could take either 

 of them up in the palm of his hand without their exhibiting any suicidal propensities. 

 Presuming on this fact, he put about a hundred of the two sorts into a sponge bag; but 

 this was asking too much of them, for on reaching home and emptying them out, he 

 found that both feather stars and brittle stars had converted themselves into a mass of 

 mincempiit, and it would have been difficult to find a single portion of an arm a quarter of 

 an inch long. 



To this Mr. Hughes replied (November 2, 1876) that the communication from Major 

 Lang as to the abundant capture of the rosy feather star in Torbay by himself and Mr. 

 Hunt with the dredge was a valuable contribution to the study of the question of the 

 appearance and disappearance in certain localities of certain marine animals, respecting 

 which we knew so little. It was especially interesting to the Birmingham Natural 

 History and Microscopical Society, and as president of the Society and reporter during 

 the marine excursion to Teignmouth in 1873 he read it with very great surprise and 

 pleasure. His knowledge of the locality had extended over a period of about thirteen 

 years, and during that time he had on several occasions dredged the ground mentioned 

 by Major Lang, yet never once succeeded in taking an adult specimen, much less the 

 more interesting pentacrinoid. He had not, however, dredged there since the marine 

 excursion. He said that Mr. Gosse, whose experience was very large and who resided in 

 the neighborhood, to whom he showed the mounted specimens, had never before seen 

 the animal in that form, nor was there any mention made of the adult animal in any of 

 his descriptive works except in "A Year at the Shore," where, on p. 182, he stated "We 

 sometimes but very rarely find on this coast a very lovely form of this class of 

 animals . . . Comatula rosacea, a fine specimen of which, taken by myself in a little- 

 cove near Torquay, I have delineated." This was written in 1864. In the previous 

 year Professor Allman had dredged in the same locality and communicated to the Ro3'al 

 Society of Edinburgh a paper based upon a single specimen which he took on the occasion. 

 Mr. Hughes said that it was a most remarkable circumstance, therefore, that in the 

 space of about three years the species should have become numerous to the extent 

 alluded to by Major Lang, more than a hundred being taken in one haul of the dredge, 

 and in conclusion remarked that the marine naturalist who year by year found his 

 favorite specimens disappearing on many parts of the coast would derive some con- 



