REPORT ON THE DEEP-SEA MEDUSAE. 93 



Charybdea murrayana, Hseckel (PI. XXVI.). 



Charybdea murrayana, Hseckel, 1879, System der Medusen, p. 442, No. 436. 

 CJiarybdusa murrayana, Hseckel, 1877, Prodrom. System Medus., No. 408. 



Umbrella bell-shaped, almost cubical, rather higher than broad, depressed above, 

 somewhat widened below ; lateral surfaces almost quadratic. Stomach quite flat with 

 four short oral lobes, four tuft-shaped phacelli, composed of bunches of large brush- 

 shaped filaments. The vertical distance of the heart-shaphed sense niches from the 

 umbrella margin half as great as the horizontal distance of the pedal bases. Velarium, 

 broad with twelve dendritic velar canals in each quadrant. Pedalia, a longish oval, one- 

 third as long as the height of the umbrella. Tentacles cylindrical, longer than the height 

 of the umbrella. Horizontal diameter of the umbrella, 50 mm. ; vertical diameter, 

 60 mm. 



Habitat. — West Coast of Africa, not far from Sierra Leone. Lat. 30° 10' N., long. 

 14° 51' W. Depth, 200 fathoms. Station 348. There were two well-preserved female 

 specimens, taken 9th April 1876. 



The umbrella (PI. XXVI. figs. 1, 6) is, on the whole, nearly cubical, as in most Cubo- 

 medusee. The vertical diameter (60 mm.) is however rather greater than the largest 

 horizontal diameter (50 mm.) ; four rounded, interradial " corner pillars" (corresponding 

 to the tentacles) project more or less strongly at the four vertical lateral corners of the 

 cube, whilst the four perradial lateral walls (corresponding to the pouches) recede between 

 the pillars and seem more depressed. As they do not lie quite vertically but diverge a 

 little below, the umbrella has really the shape of a truncated, regular quadrilateral 

 pyramid. Its upper apical surface is slightly depressed and circumscribed bke a cap, 

 by a horizontal coronal furrow. 



The exumbrella, as in most Cuboniedusee, is divided by longitudinal furrows into a 

 number of arese, projecting convexly between the furrows. We can generally distinguish 

 sixteen such exumbral furrows, viz., firstly, eight subradial furrows (fig. 1, ea), which 

 separate the four broader perradial lateral walls from the four narrower corner pillars ; 

 secondly, four perradial furrows, which divide the four depressed lateral walls in two and 

 extend downwards from the ocular crypt to the velarium (fig. 1, ep) ; and thirdly, four 

 interradial furrows, which halve the four projecting corner pillars (ei). The last-named 

 furrows are the deepest, so that the two halves of each pillar project in the form of 

 semi-cylindrical swellings. The four pedalia, which bear the tentacles, run out below 

 from the pillars. The four perradial sense clubs, alternate regularly with the pedalia, 

 and lie high above the umbrella margin in a special cavity of the exumbrella, the sense 

 niche (" crypta rhopalaris," eo). The external heart-shaped entrance to this deeply 

 hollowed crypt is partly covered by the scale of the rhopalium (" squama rhopalaris "), a 

 protective scale of the exumbrella, projecting above the opening like a roof. The 

 exumbrella appears finely granulated, as numerous urticating warts or round groups of 



