MUSEUM OF COMrARATIVE ZOOLOGY. 11 



end of the calcareous joints, but sometimes from the middle. The calcareous 

 joints are ivory-white, elongated, round, slightly enlarged at the ends, usually 

 faintly and often indistinctly striated longitudinally, appearing smooth to the 

 naked eye, but finely granulous under a lens; they are tul)ular, having a cen- 

 tral tube equal to about a third or a fourth of their total diameter. Chitiuuus 

 joints are usually golden yellow or bronze-color, sometimes plain brown, short, 

 scarcely longer than thick in the larger branches, about twice as long as thick 

 in the smaller ones, where they become translucent and brownish or amber- 

 color, without the metallic lustre seen in those of the larger branches. 



The calicles are usually, in dried specimens, prominent, elongated, some- 

 what expanding toward the end, and are crowded nearly equally over the 

 whole surface; they are covered with large, conspicuous, acute spicula, which 

 form, at summit, eight sharp projecting spinous points. The ca3nenchynia is 

 thin, translucent, yellowish, filled with long and large fusiform, conspicuous 

 spicula. 



A large specimen, well preserved in alcohol, from the Gloucester fisheries, 

 lot 367, shows remarkable variations in the length and form of the calicles. 

 Over most of the branches they are very long and prominent, constricted in 

 the middle, with an expanded base and enlarged summit, crowned by eight 

 prominent spines, surrounding the incurved and nearly retracted tentacles 

 (Fig. 3 a). In this form of calicle the length is two to three times the average 

 diameter. But on other branches the calicles are only prominent, subconical 

 verrucse, broadest at base, with the summit narrow, and the spines but little 

 prominent (Fig. 3 b); these are often about as broad as high. Intermediate 

 forms also occur on this specimen. The calicles are irregularly but rather 

 uniformly scattered over the whole surface, and are mostly separated by spaces 

 two or three times as great as their breadth, though some are in contact at 

 their bases. The surface of the cocnenchyma and calicles in this example is 

 covered with a soft integument, which nearly conceals the spicules, except at the 

 border of the calicles; but they become conspicuous when dried. Tliis exam- 

 ple also has the basal part, which is deeply divided into irregular-, palmate, 

 flattened lobes, or root-like expansions, by means of which it anchors itself in 

 the mud. 



The large projecting spicula of the calicles are fusiform, usually more or 

 less bent, and either acute at both ends or acute at the outer end and obtuse 

 at the inner (Fig. 3 c, e); the surface is nearly smooth, or only slightly rough- 

 ened in longitudinal lines on the basal part, or sometimes throughout, but in 

 many cases the longitudinal lines of points become more evident on the inner 

 end. They have a large yellowish brown nuclear portion. The larger of 

 these measure 4.40 by .35, 4.10 by .33, 4.10 by .30, 3.90 by .25, 3.80 by .30, 

 3.70 by .22, 3.60 l)y .30, 3.00 by .30, 3.00 by .20 mm. 



With these, below the margin, and in the polyps, there are many smaller 

 and more slender, partly fusiform, partly oblong or rod-like spicula, with both 

 ends similar, and either acute or obtuse, and usually distinctly but finely 

 lined and roughened longitudinally and obliquely, especially near the ends, 



