578 TFIE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 



11. Asterias (Cosmastcrias) sulcifera (Valenciennes, M.S.), Perrier. 



Asteracanthion sulcifer (Valenciennes, M.S.), Perrier, 1869, Ann. Sci. Nat, 5e Serie, t. xii. p. 235, 



pi. 1, figs. 14, a, b, c. 

 Asterias sulcifer, Perrier, 1S75, Revis. Stell. Mus., p. 58 (Archives de Zool. exper., t. iv. p. 322). 



Locality. — Station 306a. In the Messier Channel, between Wellington Island and 

 the west coast of Chili. January 2, 1876. Lat. 48° 27' 0" S., long. 74° 30' 0" W. 

 Depth 345 fathoms. Blue mud. Bottom temperature 46°"0 Fahr. ; surface temperature 

 57 0, 5 Fahr. 



Remarks. — There are several large examples from the Messier Channel which I have 

 referred to this species. They accord exactly with the description given by Perrier, and 

 appear to me to resemble more closely the type specimens preserved in the Jardin des 

 Plantes, at Paris, than those in the British Museum. It is not improbable that the latter 

 may have to be ranked as a variety. The differences affect the number and size of the 

 spinelets — characters, however, in which nearly every example shows some variation. 



C. Asterias scalprifera group : Subgenus Smilasteeias, nov. 



12. Asterias (Smilasterias) scalprifera, n. sp. (PI. C. figs. 4-6 ; PI. CIII. figs. 1 and 2). 



Rays five. R = 58 mm. ; r = 8 mm. R > 7 r. Breadth of a ray a little beyond the 

 base, 11 "5 mm. 



Rays elongate, subcyliudrical, rather swollen near the base, but not abruptly, thence 

 tapering gradually to the extremity. Disk small, convex and high. Interbrachial arcs 

 acutely angular, the rays appearing to be crushed together at the base. 



The abactinal area is beset with small plates, the majority of which are nearly as long 

 as broad. A median radial series of plates rather larger than the others proceeds regularly 

 and uninterruptedly from the disk to the extremity. The plates on each side of this can- 

 not be said to form regular longitudinal lines, though a tendency towards this arrangement 

 appears to be present ; a transverse correspondence of the plates is much more distinctly 

 traceable. The plates bear a number of small, low, round-tipped, equal, papilliform spinelets, 

 which are widely spaced upon the plate, and amongst them are large forcipiform pedicellaria? 

 widely spaced and isolated, and nearly as large as the spinelets, from which they can only 

 be distinguished by careful examination w r ith a magnifying-glass. No definite order of 

 arrangement of the spinelets and pedicellariae on the plates is to be observed, but owing 

 to the presence of indistinct transverse wrinkles and sutures, and the transverse corre- 

 spondence of plates above mentioned, a certain general transverse character is given to the 

 disposition of the spinulation as a whole. One or two papula? are present in the inter- 

 spaces between the plates. 



The armature of the adambulacral plates consists of three spinelets closely placed at 

 the base, but radiating a little apart, and forming a transverse and very slightly oblique 



