INTRODUCTION. 13 



for the following year they described a new genus, 

 Pelonnui, with two new species from the Scottish seas, 

 P. ron-in/iitti and P.yl<tbr<i. This year (1840) witnessed 

 a considerable addition to our list, eighteen species 

 being recorded by Thompson (' Ann. Nat. Hist.,' v) 

 from the Irish coast, of which the following ten were 

 new to our fauna : the Ascul'm r<-liinrtt<i of Linnaeus, 

 Mailer's Ascidia renosn, A.aspersa, A. scabrn, A. yr<il- 

 leloiji-t'iniiiw, and A. orbictilni-i*, and Savigny's Ct/ntltin 

 diidi<-ns, Distoma rnbr-nui, Botnjllus Leachii, and B. 

 polycyclusJ] 



Macgillivray, in his ' History of the Molluscous Ani- 

 mals of Aberdeen, Kincardine, and Banff,' published in 

 1843, describes only four species [as Cynthia tuleroxn, 

 Ascidia jn-iinuni, A. opuUun, and A. intestinalis~\, the first- 

 two of which were new to our shores. One of the four 

 was wrongly identified with Midler's AschUn prinnint, 

 [being the species since named A. sordida], and another, 

 A. opalinci, is the A. "parallelogramma of Miiller. 



[In the following year William Thompson, in his 

 " Additions to the Fauna of Ireland ' (Ami. Nat. 

 Hist.,' xiii) recorded eleven species of which the fol- 

 lowing eight were new to our shores : Asei<li canwa, 

 Amaroucium proliferum, Leptoclinum gelatinosum., L. 

 ii/<ii-nliihiiii, L. iixjteruin, L. J/ii'inii (as aureuni), Botri/Hiis 

 (/I'li/Hiens, and B. bivittatus ; and in 1846 (op. fit., 

 xviii) he added Botri/Uits albirnns and B. rotifera-.~\ 



Sir John Gr. Dalyell's ' Rare and Remarkable Animals 

 of Scotland ' was published in 1847-48. In it upwards 

 of twenty species of Tunicata are figured and de- 

 scribed ; but in most instances the figures and descrip- 

 tions are not sufficient to enable us to determine the 

 species. It is, therefore, quite impossible to say 

 whether the list contains anything new or not. Many 

 of the species are not named, and indeed several of 

 those which are named are erroneously identified with 

 previously-known species. The figures, though elabor- 

 ately got up, are of but little use. Sir John unfortu- 

 nately adopted the erroneous principles that a naturalist 



