General Catalogue of South African Crustacea. 363 



1888. G. I. ? Henderson, Challenger Anonaura, Eeports, vol. xxvii., 



p. 120, pi. 12, figs. 6, 6a. 



After describing Galatliea dispersa, Bate, 1859, from British 

 specimens, and stating that he cannot find any points of 

 difference in the Challenger examples, Henderson continues : 

 " Two species of Galatliea were taken in Simon's Bay, South 

 Africa, at a depth of 5 to 18 fathoms, from which locality 

 the type of Galatliea labidolcpta, Stimpson, was procured. 

 The first of these, represented by a single male specimen 

 (figured twice the natural size on pi. xii.), which I refer with 

 considerable hesitation to Stimpson's species, is either very 

 closely allied to or identical with Galatliea dispersa. The 

 second species, represented by three imperfect specimens, 

 is of much smaller size, the body of a male measuring 

 17'5 mm. in length, while a female with ova measures only 

 11 mm. In these the merus of the external maxillipedes 

 is considerably longer and narrower than the ischium (a 

 character in which it agrees with the common European 

 Galatliea squamifera, Leach), the inner margin bears two 

 acute spinules near its distal end, and a few minute spinules 

 are present on the outer margin. The chelipedes in the single 

 specimen in which they are still present (a female) are very 

 slender, and the fingers exceed the palm in length. It is 

 impossible to say which of these species, or indeed whether 

 either of them, is referable to Galatliea labidolcpta. The 

 original description of the latter is very incomplete and the 

 size is not recorded ; the brief diagnosis would indeed apply 

 to either of the Challenger species in most respects, but as 

 regards the external maxillipedes, in the form of which they 

 differ to a marked extent, Stimpson has furnished no account." 



1907. G. 1., Stimpson, Smithson. Misc. Coll., vol. xlix., p. 231. 



In this posthumous account Stimpson still gives no descrip- 

 tion of the third maxillipeds, but says : "The dimensions of 

 a male specimen are : Length of the carapax, - 32 ; breadth, 

 - 21 ; length of rostrum, O'll ; of chelipeds, 0'58 inch. 

 Females are generally larger, the carapax in one being 

 0'4 inch in length." Bonnier's largest specimen of Galatliea 

 dispersa measured at full stretch from front to apex 39 mm., 

 of which the carapace took 20 mm., four-fifths of an inch as 

 compared with only two-fifths in Stimpson's species, which 

 was " dredged from a sandy bottom in twelve fathoms in 

 Simon's Bay, Cape of Good Hope." 



