180 Z. ASTEROIDA. Virgularia. 



thickness throughout, and exhibits no mark of attachment at either 

 end. When broken, it exhibits a radiated surface, like the broken 

 spine of an echinus. The axis appears to have little connection with 

 the fleshy part, and to consist of concentric layers deposited by the 

 soft parts surrounding- it. When a portion of the axis is broken off 

 from either extremity, the animal retracts at that part, so as con- 

 tinually to expose a fresh naked portion of the axis : hence we can 

 take out the axis entirely from its soft sheath, and we always find 

 the lower pinnae of the animal drawn up closely together, as if 

 by the frequent breaking of the base. These very delicate and brit- 

 tle animals seem to be confined to a small circumscribed part of the 

 coast which has a considerable depth and a muddy bottom, and the 

 fishermen accustomed to dredge at that place believe, from the clean- 

 ness of the Virgularise when brought to the surface, that they stand 

 erect at the bottom with one end fixed in the mud or clay. Mul- 

 ler's specimens were likewise found on a part of the Norwegian coast 

 with a muddy bottom. The Polypi, much resembling those of the 

 common Lobularia digitata, are long, cylindrical, transparent, marked 

 with longitudinal white lines, and have eight tentacula which pre- 

 sent long slender transparent filaments or cilise on each of the lateral 

 surfaces when fully expanded. The polypi are easily perceived ex- 

 tending through the lateral expansions or pinnae, to near the solid 

 axis, where we observe two transverse rows of small round white ova 

 placed under each pinna, and contained within the fleshy substance. 

 These ova appear to pass along the pinnae, to be discharged through 

 the polypi, as in the Lobularia, Gorgonia, Caryophyllea, Alcyonia, 

 &c." Grant. 



The figures in our plate were drawn from specimens with which 

 I was favoured by Dr Coldstream, and which had been preserved for 

 some time in spirits ; but to shew the difference between the animal 

 in this contracted condition and when alive, I have placed beside 

 them Figures 5 and 6, copied from Muller. The dissimilarity between 

 figures taken in these diff"erent states has rendered the synonymy of 

 the species perplexed and almost inextricable. According to Cuvier, 

 Lamarck, and Blainville, the species delineated by Muller, and which 

 is certainly identical with the British one, is not synonymous with 

 the Linnaean ; but this opinion rests solely upon the circumstance 

 of Linnaeus having quoted a figure in the " Mus. Ad. Fr." — belong- 

 ing confessedly to another Zoophyte — as a representative of the spe- 

 cies he intended, which may have been done from the then un- 

 certainty of the limits of the species, or from having seen specimens 

 in spirits only. His character is verv applicable to our animal, — 



