REPORT ON THE CRUSTACEA MACRURA. 



553 



joint is three times as long as the first, and the third is about one-fourth the length of 

 the second. The flagella are very unequal, the upper being stout and about the length 

 of the peduncle, the lower slender and about two-thirds the length of the animal. 



The second pair of antennas has the inferior tooth at the base very short, and the 

 scaphocerite pointed and a little longer than the peduncle of the upper pair, and 

 terminates in a nagellum which is half as long again as the entire animal. 



The first pair of pereiopoda is asymmetrical. In our specimen that on the right 

 is the smaller. It has the palm of the propodos short, and the pollex and dactylos long, 

 slender, and gaping, thickly fringed with long hairs on the inner and outer margins, 

 on which they extend back nearly to the carpal articulation ; the meros is furnished at 

 the upper anterior angle with a small tooth ; the left hand is not much longer than 

 the right, but has the propodos long and the dactylos short ; the extremities of pollex 

 and dactylos are abruptly curved to meet each other ; the carpos is short and the 

 meros is armed with a smaU tooth at the antero-superior angle. The second pair of 

 pereiopoda has the carpos five-articulate ; the first two articuH are subequally long, the 

 three following are subequally short, as also is the terminal minute chela. The third 

 and fourth pairs of pereiopoda have the meros long and broad, whereas that of the fifth 

 pair is slender and not quite so long. 



The rhipidura is well developed, having the lateral plates longer than the telson, 

 which has the distal angles furnished with a small spine, and two others placed longi- 

 tudinally on the dorsal surface on each side of the median line, subequally distant from 

 the anterior and posterior extremities, the latter of which is fringed with long hairs. 



Habitat. — Hong Kong, at a depth of about 10 fathoms. One specimen, male. 



Judging by the description of Milne-Edwards I have little doubt that this species 

 is Alpheus rapax of Fabricius, but the figure given by de Haan exhibits markings on 

 the outer side of the great chela that are scarcely consistent with the following, which 

 he quotes from Fabricius — " Manu majore compressa lasvi digitis brevibus ;" and de 

 Haan also says of his own specimen — " Manus majoris subparallelse latere externo 

 bicostato," and figures it with longitudinal ribs ; it differs, apparently, only in 

 degree from that of Alpheus rnalabaricus, Fabr. (brevicristatus) in his pi. xlv. fig. 1. 



(ZOOL. CHALL. EXP. — PAIiT. LII. — 1887.) Fff 70 



