During a visit to Hamburg in the summer of 1910 Prof. MICHAELSEN 

 asked me to undertake the study of the crinoids which he and Dr. R. 

 HARTMEYER had collected in Western Australia. I had just completed a 

 monograph upon the crinoids of Australia, based upon the collections 

 of the Australian Museum at Sydney, New South Wales, but had been 

 sadly hampered in the zoogeographic aspect of the work by an entire 

 absence of material from the western shores of that continent ; and I had, 

 not long before, published an account of the criuoids collected by the 

 German steamer %t Gazelle". It was therefore with the keenest anticipation 

 that I accepted the offer of Prof. MICHAELSEN, knowing that by the study 

 of these specimens much light would be thrown upon many obscure points, 

 in particular upon the intermingling of the northern and the southern 

 faunas along the western coast. 



Subsequent to my visit to Hamburg I visited the British Museum 

 where I found a number of unrecorded Australian criuoids, and studied 

 all the Australian material preserved in that institution. With the kind 

 permission of Prof. F. JEFFREY BELL, to whose courtesy I am indebted 

 for the privilege of studying these rich collections, I have incorporated the 

 records herein. 



I wish to offer my best thanks to Prof. MICHAELSEN and to Dr. HART- 

 MEYER for their kindness in giving me the opportunity of studying such 

 an interesting collection, and also to Prof. LUDWIG DODERLEIN of Strass- 

 burg, to whom the collection was originally assigned, for his courtesy in 

 relinquishing it for my benefit. 



History of the Study of the West Australia Crinoids, with a brief 



Survey of the Literature. 



LAMARCK was the first author to mention a W T est Australian crinoid. 

 In 1816 he described, in addition to four tropical Australian species, Co- 

 inatula [Comatulella] brachiolata ; but the locality label seems to have been 

 mislaid, and he did not recognize it as an Australian form, giving as its 

 habitat "1'ocean atlantiqueV". There is now with the two specimens upon 

 which LAMARCK'S description was based a label reading "Australia" ; I sus- 



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