220 PENTAGT^E. 



species from any other British kind of Cucurnaria. It is 

 allied to the Holotlmria fusus of Muller, and is one of 

 those forms which connect the true Cucurnaria with the 

 singular worm-like Synaptee, many of which at first sight 

 rather resemble Annelides than Holotlmria. None of these 

 curious creatures have as yet been discovered in the British 

 seas ; indeed they seem mostly to be congregated in the 

 Indian Sea, and among the islands of the Pacific. They 

 are often beautifully coloured, and attain a great size, even 

 three feet and more in length. The Holotlmria digitata of 

 Montagu, a species of Ohirodota probably, appears to be 

 allied to them. 



Mr. F. D. Bennett describes one of these worm-like 

 Holotlmria as having its cylindrical body usually distended 

 with muddy water ; its skin rough with minute spines, 

 and of a clouded olive colour, and its mouth surrounded 

 by tentacula, and furnished with bony plates. He says it 

 lies passive upon the coral shoals close to the land, its 

 body placed in a waved form and often attached by its 

 posterior extremity to a rock. The disappearance of the 

 feet, small hooked prickles supplying their places, indicates 

 the progression through Synapta of the Holothuriadie to 

 the Sipuuculida. 



