oj the Genus Fungia. 497 



with the specimens above mentioned, a slight notice of this sub- 

 ject appeared under the article Fungia in the " Encyclopedia 

 Metropolitana "; and I regret that when I communicated to the 

 author of that account some remarks on the corals which I had 

 collected, I was not aware that he intended to publish a notice of 

 this discovery; as I could have given him more particulars upon 

 the subject. 



That writer states, " that they seem, when young, to be coni- 

 cal, and attached to some marine bod)^ often their parent, by 

 the base, which is contracted into a kind of stem;" and " when 

 young, the coral has the appearance of a solitary CaryophyUia ; 

 in this state the animal only occupies the upper surface, but 

 when it is full grown and free it completely incloses the coral." 



As long as the young Fungia retains the form of a Caryo- 

 phyllia it is entirely enveloped by the soft parts of the animal; 

 but as the upper disc of the coral spreads, and it assumes its 

 characteristic form, the pedicle is left naked, and the soft part 

 extends only to the line where the separation afterwards takes 

 place. I consider the cases in which young Fungia are found 

 fixed to the underside of others of the same species, to arise from 

 the accidental attachment of the young polype, when detached 

 from the ovarium of the parent, and by the motion of the water 

 floated underneath a larger one of its own species, the edges of 

 which were not so even as to touch the rock or coral on which 

 it rested, at every part of its circumference. In such cases the 

 soft parts of the older specimen would continue to cover the 

 short stem of the younger individual, and hence its separation 

 from its pedicle would be prevented. 



3s2 EXPLA 



