Zoology.] NATURAL HISTORY OF VICTORIA. [Polyzoa. 



Plate 117, Figs. 1 and 2. 

 BEANIA DECUMBENS (P. McG.). 



[Genus BEANIA (Johnston). (Sub-kingd. Mollusca. Class Polyzoa. Order Iufun- 

 dibulata. Sub-order Cheilostomata. Family Bicellariidse.) 



Gen. Char. — Zoarium creeping or loosely adnate. Zooecia disjunct, connected by (usually) 

 corneous tubes, erect or decumbent, ovate or boat-shaped, entirely open in front, and filled in by 

 a membrane. Usually one or two capitate pedunculate avicularia, perfect, aborted or altered 

 in form.] 



Description. — Zooecia much elongated ; two or three short spines at the top ; 

 14-16 long- spines on each side, arching- over the front of the cell and those of 

 opposite sides interdigitating ; at each upper angle a smail capitate avicularium; 

 connecting tubes springing from the extremities or sides, so that the cells are 

 entirely decumbent. 



Keference. — P. H. MacGillivray, Tr. Eoy. Soc. Vict., Dec. 1881. 



Port Phillip Heads ; first found by Mr. J. Bracebridge Wilson. 

 Spreads in long, irregular lines over calcareous nodules. The 

 connecting tubes are very short, and the zocecia are arranged end 

 to end, the branches, however, originating from the sides of the 

 zocecia. In many zocecia there are one or two radical tubes from 

 the sides, fixing them to the body on which they grow. 



I have elsewhere given reasons for including most of the species 

 of Diachoris in the present genus. The zocecium in such a species 

 as D. spinigera, as pointed out by Hincks (Polyzoa, p. 66), is 

 identical in structure with that of a typical Beania. The number 

 of the connecting tubes, the seemingly constant junction of each 

 cell with six others, and, especially, the presence of capitate 

 avicularia, constituted the reason for separating Diachoris ; but 

 Hincks has described a species, D. intermedia, in which the 

 connecting tubes are four, and the symmetrical pattern is lost ; 

 and in Heller's D. hirtissima and the allied B. conferta (McG.) 

 there are no avicularia. The character of the genus Beania, as 

 now defined, depends on the structure of the cell, the margins 

 being raised and front entirely open or membranous, their 

 disjunction and connection with each other by tubes, and the 

 presence of one or two perfect or modified capitate avicularia at 

 or towards the oral end of the cell. 



The systematic position of the genus is somewhat doubtful, 

 but on the whole I agree with Mr. Hincks in referring it to 



[ & ] 



