358 BULLETIN 82, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



In his memoir on the genus Actinometra published in 1879 Carpenter determined 

 pectinata as a species of that genus. In the earlier portion of this memoir it is evi- 

 dent that he is following Miiller in considering pectinata as probably synonymous 

 with Solaris, and the specimens of the latter from the Philippines which he mentions 

 really represent the former. But while the work was in press he seems to have become 

 convinced of the distinctness of the two, for his references to the figures on the plates 

 are segregated under the names Solaris, pectinata, and robusta. He had not been able 

 to examine Comatula cumingii and, being without information regarding the position 

 of the mouth or the character of the oral pinnules, he could not definitely assign it 

 either to Actinometra or to Antedon. 



In 1881 Carpenter said that the Challenger in cruising from Cape York through 

 the Banda and Arafura Seas to the Philippines and thence southward to the Admi- 

 ralty Islands secured three species of 10-armed comasterids. One of these was C. 

 pectinata and the other two were forms of C. Solaris. He also stated that nearly all 

 the 10-armed comasterids in the Eastern Hemisphere belong to the Solaris type in 

 which the elements of the IBr series and the first two brachials are united by 

 syzygy, the only exceptions known to him being Actinometra cumingii and 2 or 3 

 undescribed species from China, Japan, and Sumatra. 



In 1882 Carpenter, in his discussion of Actinometra Solaris, noted that the speci- 

 mens brought by Professor Semper from Bohol and referred by him in 1879 (and by 

 von Graff in 1877) to Solaris are in reality pectinata; he gave what he considered 

 the essential characters of these, and also of the type specimen at Lund. He further 

 mentioned some of the characters of a specimen from Java which he had seen in the 

 Copenhagen Museum bearing the manuscript name Actinometra affinis Liitken. He 

 also referred to a couple of small specimens in the Paris Museum from the voyage of 

 Peron and Lesueur; these, however, are purpurea and not pectinata. 



In another paper published in 1882 Carpenter included a specific formula for 

 this species. 



In 1884 Prof. F. Jeffrey Bell recorded under the name Antedon irregularis, 

 Actinometra Solaris, and Actinometra, sp. juv., a number of specimens taken by the 

 Alert on the Australian coast which subsequently proved to be this species. In the 

 same year Professor von Graff again mentioned the specimens from Bohol under the 

 name of Solaris, and in 1887 he mentioned some others from the Moluccas under the 

 same name. 



In the Challenger report on the comatulids (1888) Carpenter published a very 

 detailed account of this species, which he carefully distinguished from C. Solaris. 

 He considered Aclinometra affinis Liitken, MS., of which he had published a specific 

 formula in 1883, as identical with pectinata, and Actinometra purpurea as probably 

 a young form of the same type. He mentioned that in nearly all the specimens 

 which he had examined the mouth is radial, and that some or all of the 4 posterior 

 arms are very frequently ungrooved. He also noted that the disk may be very com- 

 pletely plated in some localities, as at Cape York and at Port Curtis, though it may 

 be entirely membranous elsewhere, while the basal pinnules are much more uni- 

 formly carinate than they are in C. solans. Among the localities he gave those 

 cited by von Graff; but he said nothing about these, nor did he refer to von Graff 



