578 ORDER ABDOMINALIA. 



two discs stand exactly opposed to each other. The bases 

 of the teeth, seen from the outside (PL 24, fig. 10), seem like 

 brown little circles, with a smaller circle within. The disc 

 obscurely appears to be formed by the confluence of two 

 smaller discs which lie, I believe, at a very small angle to 

 each other : beneath each of these half discs there is a longi- 

 tudinal band of very fine hairs, the two bands uniting into 

 one, lower down within the organ. The internal longitudinal 

 edges, also, of the four lateral smaller folds are likewise 

 clothed with fine hairs ; hence we have six parallel longi- 

 tudinal rows of very fine but stiff hairs, or eight, if the united 

 bands on the two broader faces under the discs be counted 

 each as two. These bands of hairs, and the opposed discs, 

 armed with very strong teeth, can be separated and brought 

 together with force, by the action of strong constrictor and 

 diverging muscles. Hence any prey carried down the 

 oesophagus, before entering the stomach, would have to pass, 

 as it were through a mill, and be subjected to a severe 

 trituration by the discs of teeth, and immediately beneath to 

 a brushing by the six longitudinal bands of hairs. This 

 curious and unique structure answers, I believe, the same 

 purpose as the four convex, harclish, crenated buttons on 

 the posterior thoracic cirri in Alcippe, which are likewise 

 unique in that genus. I observed that in some specimens 

 the teeth had been worn quite blunt, but the teeth and hairs 

 are periodically moulted and renewed, together with the 

 whole oesophagus. 



The stomach is broadest at the upper end, and extends 

 from a little beneath the mouth down to the fifth segment 

 of the body, where it becomes narrow. It presented an 

 irregularly contracted appearance, and was covered by a 

 pulpy hepatic layer. The rectum is of rather large dia- 

 meter ; it extends from the middle of the fifth segment to 

 the end of the eighth segment of the body, or seventh of the 

 thorax, where the large anus is situated, lying between the 

 posterior abdominal cirri, and partly hollowed out in this 

 seventh segment. The rectum, as in all other cirripedes, is 

 periodically moulted. The food is of a bright green colour, 

 as if of a confervoid nature ; the triturating and brushing 

 action of the oesophagus seems to roll this matter into pellets, 



