130 THE AQUARIAN NATURALIST. 



cess ; and from the circumstance of its being exceed- 

 ingly manageable, and easily examined in a watch- 

 glass under the microscope, will frequently be found 

 a favourite inmate of the marine vivarium. Cam- 

 panularise of various kinds are, moreover, to be met 

 with on every coast ; so that, with a little industrious 

 searching, the student of Nature will find no diffi- 

 culty in procuring specimens wherewith to verify the 

 following circumstances connected with their history. 



The CAMPANULARIA DICHOTOMA, or Sea-thread Co- 

 ralline (PL II. fig. 5), is one of the most delicate, ele- 

 gant, and interesting among the numerous race of ar- 

 borescent zoophytes. It is invariably found attached 

 to some foreign object, from the surface of which it 

 rises erect by a dark brown tubular stem, extremely 

 slender, being truly no thicker than a silken thread, 

 but tough and elastic. The polypary, as in the rest 

 of this Order, is occupied by an internal pith, and in 

 each of the little bells or cups which terminate the 

 individual branches is lodged a hydriform polyp, in 

 all respects of the same nature as those we have 

 already described. This coralline is of great luxu- 

 riance : before a specimen has attained the height of 

 an inch, it may bear from 50 to 60 Hydree, and on a 

 specimen nine inches high, upwards of 1200 little 

 polyps have been counted. 



The mode of propagation in the Campanularia 

 dichotoma constitutes, however, the most interesting 

 part of its history, and will furnish abundant matter 

 of research to every student in this department of the 

 domain of Nature. 



At certain seasons numerous egg-shaped vesicles 



