52 PROCEEDINGS OF THE 



the adaptation of what is so powerful an organ in the Echinus 

 to a soft-skinned urchin like Thyone. 



Syrinx nudus (Linnaeus) is not uncommon. Syrinx Harveii 

 (Forbes) was obtained this last autumn. Both extremities have 

 minute suckers, and that part of the body appears to be reticu- 

 lated, while the central portion is quite smooth, and the line 

 of separation between these two portions is most distinctly 

 defined. There is a small proboscis partly protruded in the 

 specimen. 



Synnpta tenera (Norman). In 1868 several soft, white, trans- 

 parent worms came up in one of the dredgings through the mud 

 of the Bay. They were somewhat gelatinous in appearance, and 

 were rather difficult to pick up, but were soon found to possess 

 a remarkable power of adhesion to the finger, and did not readily 

 drop off into the glass. The length was from one. to one and a 

 half inches. They were very transparent, the interior being 

 visible through the integument. A whitish ring surrounds one 

 end (the head), from which about a dozen (eleven) tentacles arise. 

 These are rather stout and dumpy in form, thick below, and taper 

 rapidly to a point, giving off two smaller ones at right angles, at 

 about one-third of the length from the extremity, and all three 

 from that point are about the same length. At the extremity 

 they are usually curved up or down, bending towards the bottom 

 like a finger. Small irregular calcareous spicula, something like 

 a femur in shape, may be observed in them. At the base of each, 

 in the angle from which they arise from the ring margin, is a 

 patch of yellowish pigment, which may possibly represent an eye. 



In the centre of this ring is the mouth. In the anterior third of 

 the animal is the stomach and the intestine, which winds down 

 the middle third, while the posterior third, and sometimes tlie 

 middle also, are quite transparent and banded with longitudinal 

 muscles. The whole surface of the integument is dotted with 

 minute anchor-shaped spicula, which give it a rough appearance, 

 and their probably projecting from the surface may possibly 

 account for the adhesive powers displayed. When the integument 

 is longitudinally corrugated, the rounded end of the anchor shaft 

 with its flukes is that which projects. These flukes are sharp 

 pointed, but it docs not appear that eitlier of them projects much 

 more than tlie othor, though it must be with one or other that 

 adhesion takes place; it is ratlier the end of the shaft to which 



