Dr. G. Lawson on Lepas anatifera. 173 



anatifera, Linn.*, a species which appears to have been much 

 confounded with the equally common L. Hillii of Leach, but 

 which is readily known from its allies by the right-hand scutum 

 being furnished internally with a prominent umbonal tooth, 

 while the left one is without any trace of this appendage. 



The specimens were densely crowded together over the whole 

 lower surface of the log, and are of variable size, from two to 

 seven or eight inches in total length. The valves are of a pearly 

 white, with a bluish-grey tinge from the underlying corium, 

 their surface marked with faint radiating strise. The edges of the 

 scuta, &c, are of an orange-colour. The carina is slightly, but 

 obtusely, "barbed." The peduncle is smooth, with encircling 

 wrinkles, and of a white, yellowish, or pale brick-red hue, ac- 

 cording to age and size of specimens, — becoming dark, almost 

 black, towards the apical or neck portion, where it unites with 

 the capitulum. The remarkable " filamentary appendages" de- 

 scribed in books as occurring at the bases of the first pair of 

 cirri in this genus, without any very special functional office 

 being assigned to them, were found to be present in all the 

 specimens I examined, and their number was constant, — two on 

 each side. Mr. Darwin quotes the following synonyms for this 

 species : — Anatifa engonata, Conrad ; A. dentata, var., Bruguiere ; 

 Pentalasmis dentatus, var., Brown. 



During the few days that the log remained on Granton Pier, 

 large quantities of the barnacle were carried away for the purpose 

 of being cooked and used as an article of food. Some foreign 

 sailors, I was told, recognized them as forming a delicacy on 

 which they had feasted on former occasions. Mr* Darwin does 

 not notice the use of any species of Lepas for food, but enume- 

 rates two species of Pollicipes and one of Balanus that are so 

 used. I am informed (he says) by Mr. L. Reeve, that Pollicipes 

 nitella is eaten on the coast of China ; and Ellis states f that 

 this is the case with P. cornucopia on the shores of Brittany. It 

 is well known that the gigantic Balanus psittacus, on the Chilian 

 coast, is sought after as a delicacy. 



The exhibition of the Lepas log on Granton Pier soon gave 

 opportunity for observing that the old tradition of the origin of 

 barnacle geese is by no means extinct. 



The occurrence of this species in such quantity in a living 

 state on a drift-log in Banff Bay is not without interest ; and I 

 have thought a record of the fact might be useful to some readers 

 of the ' Annals/ 



Mr. Peach records two instances in which, after gales of wind, 

 this species, of nearly full size, adhering to apparently freshly 

 broken-o ff Laminai'iae, has been cast upon the coasts of England 



* Darwin, Cirripedia, vol. i. p. 6/. tab. 1. fig. 1. f Phil. Trans. 1 758. 



