SYSTEMATIC AND BIOLOGICAL ACCOUNT 63 



or more in length (expanded) with twenty-seven tentilla, 5 mm. apart when expanded. The expanded 

 horns of the tentilla measured 3 mm. in length. 



I have examined closely the arrangement of the gonophores in a specimen that I anaesthetized and 

 fixed in formalin at Villefranche on 5 May 1949. The female gonophore is at the proximal end of each 

 segment, just distal to the last gastrozooid. It has a plain stalk which subdivides distally. Following it 

 is a gap, and then male gonophores and palpons are scattered over more than half the length of the 

 segment. Another gap follows and then the gastrozooid and a group of palpons are found. A newly 

 budded gastrozooid is accompanied by a single palpon. More are added in the course of growth in 

 the region of the male gonophores. The general arrangement was shown quite clearly, if a little 

 crudely, by Kolliker (18536, pi. 3). 



The pneumatophores of live specimens (7-12 cm. in length) varied in shape, presumably according 

 to the state of air-secretion. 



In jars of sea-water at Villefranche, specimens at rest took up a vertical position, but swam round 

 horizontally at the surface. On 5 May 1949, the calm water off Cap Ferrat, Villefranche, was full of 

 Agalma elegans and Stephanomia rubra, and six dozen of the former were picked out with dip-nets 

 at 8.45 a.m. on this fine sunny morning (wind S.E., light). Specimens had fourteen to twenty necto- 

 phores a side, six gastrozooid groups, and were about 17 cm. in length (contracted). It may be noted 

 that specimens like these can be lifted out of the water on a flat dip-net and jolted into jars of sea-water 

 without damage. 



Kawamura (191 1 b) studied alive a species which he identified as Agalma elegans. He captured and 

 illustrated one perfect specimen 26 cm. in length at Misaki on 29 January 19 10, and observed, without 

 being able to catch them, a number of much larger specimens that were swimming at some depth 

 from the surface. From a glance at Kawamura's figures (191 ib, pi. 7) it will be seen that there are 

 two important differences between the figure of a Misaki and a Villefranche nectophore. One is the 

 abaxial shift in position of the vertical ridge in Kawamura's specimen, and the other is the way in 

 which the lateral radial canal, in his fig. 13, crosses the lateral face of the nectosac. If these prove to 

 be constant features of a Pacific form it will merit specific rank. But Kawamura's fig. 1 3 does not appear 

 to have been so carefully drawn as others. The upper and lower vertical ' branches ' of the pedicular 

 canal described by Kawamura form the area of attachment of the muscular lamella. Kawamura 

 commented on the length of the paired horns of the tentilla, and figured them as somewhat less than 

 1 mm. in length. I measured them in an expanded, live specimen and found them to be three times 

 this length. I found also that specimens (from 7 to 12 cm. in length) were very susceptible to vibration 

 and contracted violently. 



Agalma elegans was hitherto known to occur in the Indian Ocean only from Browne's (1926) record 

 of a post larva with a couple of not very characteristic bracts, and without nectophores. It has 

 a protosiphon, a ring of palpons, and many buds. 



It is a pity that Haeckel (18886, p. 234) restricted the name Agalmopsis elegans to that one of Sars's 

 two species which had trifid tentilla, because nowhere did Sars describe or figure the rest of a specimen 

 of that species. All his figures and most of his text, based on notes made during the eight years 1835 

 to 1842, is descriptive of what Agassiz (1865) later called Nanomia cara. Kolliker (18536) had already 

 given the Agalmid a new specific name sarsii. Haeckel seems, mistakenly, to have thought that the 

 whole of Sars's plate 6 referred to the specimens with trifid tentilla. He seems, too, to have overlooked 

 the fact that eight years before his description of Agalmopsis was published, Fewkes (1880, p. 135) 

 restricted Agalmopsis elegans to the species (now Nanomia cara) that had a single terminal filament. 

 But I dare not cause further nomenclatural havoc by putting these matters right now. The best 

 thing to do is to have the name put on the list of nomina conservanda. We can be certain, however, 



