Miscellaneous. 343 



On a Malformation in Echinus Flemingii, Ball. 

 By THOS. HOWARD STEWART, Esq. 



To the Editors of the Annals of Natural History. 



GENTLEMEN, Having lately received from the Devonshire coast 

 a specimen of that beautiful British Echinoderm Echinus Flemingii, 

 which possesses a curious malformation, I have thought it worth 

 while to place it on record. 



The ant-ambulacral ring of plates surrounding the anus is com- 

 posed in the Cidariadse and Echiniadse of ten plates five genital and 

 five intergenital ; the latter are perforated with a small orifice, in 

 which the aquiferous canal terminates ; the former have each a single 

 large foramen communicating with the genital tube for the exit of the 

 ova or spermatic fluid, as the case may be. 



But, in the specimen I am now alluding to, that part of the genital 

 plate where the single orifice is usually situated is raised into a 

 papilla, and surrounded with five orifices, with the exception of that 

 on the madreporic plate, which has only three. 



Unfortunately the animal was eviscerated before this curious mal- 

 formation was observed, so that the state of the ducts cannot be 

 further investigated. 



The remainder of the corona is somewhat slightly malformed ; the 

 anal orifice is about a quarter of an inch out of its normal position, 

 and there is a considerable depression in the corona all round at 

 about an inch from the ant-ambulacral ring. The specimen was 

 obtained from about 40 fathoms depth, in the English Channel, off 

 the Devonshire coast. 



I remain, Gentlemen, 

 Royal CoU. of Surgeons, Yours, &c., 



March 15, 1860. THOS. HOWARD STEWART. 



On the Scleroaenous Granules of the Berry of Arbutus Unedo. 

 By GEORGE GULLIVER, F.R.S. 



I know not whether these granules have ever been described, either 

 in the fruit of the Strawberry-tree or in that of any other heath wort, 

 and am induced to notice them in the hope that botanists, who may 

 have the opportunity, will observe whether they exist in any allied 

 species. Should the granules be regularly present in the fruit, as I 

 believe, and prove peculiar to this interesting tree, they will afford 

 for it a new, very simple, plain, and durable distinctive character. 



The granules are very dense and hard, rounded, of a whitish 

 colour when cleaned, scarcely as big as poppy-seed, and are scattered 

 throughout the pulp of the fruit, within the cells of which they seem 

 to originate. But, though so much smaller than the seeds of the 

 Arbutus, the granules greatly exceed the seeds of the same berry in 

 number and weight. 



The structure of the granules is the same as that of the gritty 

 tissue of the Pear, described and figured by Professor Quekett (Lee- 



