6 THE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 



between the mode of growth of those fan-like forms included in Milne-Edwards' division 

 Rhipidipaihes and some species of Rhipidogorgia, Echinogorgia, &c. , is most marked, and 

 has led Esper and others into numerous errors of identification. In the absence of polyps, 

 the nature of the ccenenchyma and the presence of spines form the only reliable 

 characters at the present day by which the Antipathidae may be identified. Ellis and 

 Solander in speaking of Antipathes cupressina, Pallas ( = Gorgonia abies, Linnaeus), put the 

 matter very clearly, so far as the differences were known at the time. They say, "Linnaeus 

 has classed this species under Gorgonia, to which it is very nearly allied ; but the flesh 

 of this tribe is so remarkably gelatinous and the whole bone or hard part is so covered 

 with sjiines, which even are to be distinguished in the inner lamina?, that there is 

 sufficient reason for making of it another genus." 



There is one point in which Pallas was mistaken, viz., the nature of the ovaries. 

 These he regarded as external chitinous bodies, not always present, which are now T known 

 to be parasitic structures. 



He says : — " Ovaria,, calyces cornea stirpi insidentes, subturbinati," and thought the 

 presence of these calyces to indicate an affinity between Antipathes and Sertularia ; with 

 this exception, however, the characters of his genus Antipathes are remarkably clear and 

 accurate. 



Pallas (17) describes ten species in all, one of which, Antipathes orichalcea, as he 

 himself suspected, does not belong to the group. Two species are from the Mediterranean, 

 viz., Antipathes fcenicidacea and Antipathes dichotoma, the latter described from- a 

 species figured by Marsigli, and of which Pallas had not seen a specimen. The other 

 seven are all from the Indian Ocean, a general term of which it is at present difficult to 

 define the limits. Antipathes cupressina is evidently the Gorgonia abies of Linnaeus, 

 and Antipathes spiralis is the Gorgonia spiralis of the 10th edition of Linnaeus' 

 Systema naturae, the Gorgonia abies, var. spiralis, of the 12th edition. 



The five remaining species, viz., Antipathes ericoides, Antipathes pennaeea, 

 Antipathes myriophylla, Antipathes fiabellum, and Antipathes clathrata, appear to be 

 chiefly founded on types described and often figured in the Herbarium Amboinense of 

 Rumphius. These have not all been identified by subsequent authors, but all apparently 

 conform to the ordinal characters. 



Twenty years later Ellis and Solander (19) described six species of Antipathes, three 

 already recorded by Pallas, and three new ones, viz., Antipathes ulex from Batavia, 

 Antipathes subpinnata from the Mediterranean, and Antipathes alopecuroides from South 

 Carolina. The latter species, probably owing to imperfect definition and the absence of 

 a figure, has not since been identified, although there appears every probability that it 

 must have been met with in one or other of the American Exploring Expeditions. The 

 same authors give a figure of the polyp of Antipathes spiralis, Pallas, or at least of the 

 tentacles and oral cone, the basal portion of the polyp being omitted. The polyp was 



