Boone, Echinodermata, Cruises of "Eagle" and "Ara," 1921-28 101 



Material examined : One large specimen in spirit, dredged in 200 

 fms., 9 miles S. by S. W. of Port Basque, Newfoundland, September 

 1, 1926, by the "Ara." One dry specimen, from the coast of Maine, 

 collected by the "Eagle." 



Color: There is an exquisite color plate of this curious basket-fish 

 in the Monaco series, Fasc, XXXIV, pi. IX, showing the animal to 

 be a rich burnt sienna on both faces, with deeper tones of this color 

 on the disk. 



Technical description: This basket-fish is one of the earliest 

 American echinoderms to be critically described and figured. The 

 following notes were made by the colonial governor of Connecticut, 

 John "Winthrop, in 1670 and 1671, and published in the Philosophical 

 Transactions of the Royal Society of London : 



"There is besides a strange kind of fish, which was taken by a 

 fisherman, when he was fishing for cods in the sea which is without 

 Massachusetts Bay in New England. It was taken alive by a hook. 

 The name of it I know not ; nor can I write more particularly of it, 

 because I could not yet speak with the fisherman who brought it from 

 the sea. I have not seen the like. The mouth is in the middle ; and 

 they say that all the arms you see round about were in motion when 

 it was first taken. 



"We omit the other particulars here, that we may reflect a little 

 on this elaborate piece of nature. The fish, as it is yet nameless, we 

 may call Piscis Echinostellaris Visciformis; its body resembling an 

 echinus or egg-fish, the main branches, a star, and the dividing of 

 the branches, the plant mistletoe. See fig. 1, pi. XI. This fish spreads 

 itself from a pentagonal root, which encompasses the mouth, being 

 in the middle at (a), into five main limbs or branches, each of which, 

 just at the issuing out from the body, subdivides itself into two (as 

 at 1) and each of these 10 branches do again (at 2) divide into two 

 parts, making 20 lesser branches: each of which again (at 3) divide 

 into two smaller branches, making in all 40. Those again (at 

 4) into 80; and those (at 5) into 160; and those (at 6) into 320; 

 those (at 7) into 640; at 8, into 1280; at 9, into 2560; at 10, into 

 5120; at 11, into 10,240; at 12, into 20,840; at 13, into 40,960; at 14, 

 into 81,920; beyond which, the farther expanding of the fish could 

 not be certainly traced, though possible each of those 81,920 small 

 sprouts or threads, in which the branches of this fish seemed to termi- 

 nate, might, if it could have been examined when living, have been 

 found to subdivide yet farther. The branches between the joints 



