PART 5 A MONOGRAPH OF THE EXISTING CRINOIDS 391 



Prof. Nils von Hofsten has worked out in great detail the local distribution of 

 this species in the Ice Fjord, Spitzbergen. He writes that it is common there, although 

 according to his information it never occurs there in such great masses as it sometimes 

 does elsewhere. It lives there, as usual, on a bottom of rather diverse character; 

 apparently it is more common on mud than on stony ground, but on the other hand 

 perhaps it is less common on unmixed mud than on different sorts of mixed bottom. 



According to his observations the bathymetrical range in the Ice Fjord is from 28 

 to about 250 meters, but it is not impossible that it may go deeper. In the entire 

 outer half of the fjord it was not found in a lesser depth than 70 meters, and it is absent 

 from all the bays opening off the main fjord. Prof, von Hofsten says that the reason 

 for this restricted distribution is not clear; either the species is everywhere commonest 

 at these depths, or the character of the bottom (partially very loose mud) is unfavorable 

 in the regions mentioned. 



That it may occur, at least casually, in the inner portions of the bays tributary 

 to the Ice Fjord is shown by the Prince of Monaco's record in Temple Bay, the east- 

 ward continuation of Sassen Bay, while I believe that Prof. Goodsir's collector, who 

 reported it in such enormous numbers, worked in Advent Bay. 



The Stor Fjord (Wijde Jans Water) is a much larger body of water than the Ice 

 Fjord, with a much less incised coast line. Here this species occurs locally throughout, 

 in from 27 to 139 meters, sometimes on fine or soft mud or clay, but usually on mud and 

 pebbles or mud and gravel, sometimes on gravel alone. On the western side of the 

 entrance it has been dredged on coarse gravel in enormous numbers, but though very 

 generally distributed it has elsewhere, as in the Ice Fjord, been found somewhat spar- 

 ingly. 



Scheuring (1922) remarked that the Poseidon found very large individuals only 

 at station 24 on a cold bottom in the central Barents Sea. The specimens from the 

 Murman coast were all small. But wherever this species was found the individuals 

 were numerous. 



Hartlaub wrote (1900) that on the Olga expedition the richest catches of this 

 species were brought up on the return journey from Spitzbergen to Hammerfest at 

 some distance from the coast of the former, and that at many stations this form was 

 found in quantities comparable to the masses of Gorgonocephalus eucnemis and Stron- 

 gylocentrotus droebachiensis. As he is well acquainted with the comatulids, but does 

 not mention Poliometra prolixa it is probable that the Olga did not find that species, 

 and that all the records given by Hartlaub under Antedon refer to Heliometra glacialis. 



In his account of the invertebrates collected by the Vega, Dr. Anton Stuxberg 

 described what he called an Antedon- Astrophy ton association, of which the two chief 

 elements are this species and Gorgonocephalus eucnemis. He says that this is one of 

 the few associations that are rarely investigated, and at least shows some peculiar 

 animal forms. In a few places on the Taimyr Land coast (Vega stations 62, 70, 71) 

 it is found typical and unmixed in 64 to 73 meters on a bottom of fine clay, or clay 

 with large stones. 



The community is characterized by many handsome individuals of Heliometra 

 glacialv? and of Gorgonocephalus eucnemis, which are the predominant forms. Besides 

 these Stuxberg found at sta. 62 Cleippides quadricuspis, Aegina echinata, Anonyx, sp. 

 (tpumttus), Scalpellum stroemi, Solaster [Poraniomorpha] tumidus, and a new pennatulid. 

 At stas. 70 and 71 there were found in large numbers several species of polyzoans, 



