162 



THE SPONGES OF THE WEST-CENTRAL PACIFIC 



Text Figure No. 105. Spicules of Ophlitaspongia mima. A: Tylostyle, X 182. B: Heads 

 of two of the tylostyles, X 782. C: Three of the toxas, X 782. 



1826, page 116, is European, and has spicules much smaller than those of 

 mima. Nidificata, which was first described by Kirkpatrick, 1907, page 274, 

 from the Antarctic, and also has been reported from South America, has 

 spicules much larger than those of mima. The third species was first de- 

 scribed as Desmacella pennata by Lambe, 1894, page 129 from the west 

 coast of North America. It also has been reported from the same coast by 

 de Laubenfels, 1927, page 265, and 1932, page 103. This has megascleres 

 much thicker than those of mima, and some of them have heads incipiently 

 spined. 



The species basifixa, described from the north Atlantic by Topsent, 1913, 

 page 39, and recorded from Japan by Burton, 1935, page 74, is a black 

 crust with two size-ranges of monactinal megascleres. It is here left in 

 Ophlitaspongia with doubt. 



The name mima is selected because this species tends to mimic the others 

 of its genus. 



GENUS LITASPONGIA, new 



This genus is here established in the family Ophlitaspongiidae for 

 sponges which, like Ophlitaspongia, have monactinal megascleres and only 

 toxas as microscleres, but unlike the incrusting Ophlitaspongia, they are 

 ramose or arborescent in growth. The type is here designated as the species 

 described as Ophlitaspongia arbuscula by Row, 1911, page 347, from the 

 Red Sea. His O. horrida from the same locality (page 349) is here dropped 

 in synonymy to arbuscula. A second species for this genus is that described 

 as Echinoclathria nodosa by Carter, 1885, page 356, from southeastern Aus- 

 tralia. His E. subhispida from the same locality (page 356) is here dropped 

 in synonymy to nodosa. 



