208 AUSTRALIAN FRESH-WATER SPONGES, 



undulately grooved with longitudinal stria). Grooves narrower 

 than the interstices Culices somewhat close with an irregular 

 quincuncial arrangement, but on the youngest branches sometimes 

 alternate, projecting, semicircular, the septa of the upper side 

 being replaced by a transverse ridge. Septa six to nine, ordinarily 

 eight, thin at base, rapidly narrowing. All round the calices an 

 irregular series of ampullae as large as the calices. No columella 

 visible in the somewhat deep fossa. The diameter of the branches 

 is about two millim., diminishing to half that measurement near 

 the tips. At the base there is a thick coenenchyma from the 

 coalescence of the branches, and in this the calices are clustered 

 irregularly, and the calices are complete circles in some few 

 cases, and do not project so much as those on the branches. 

 The diameter of the largest is scarcely half a millimetre. 



This species possesses remarkable characters which distinguish 

 it from any other. Such are the semicircular calices, and the 

 ridge which separates the upper, or non-septate side from the 

 coenenchyma. The small number of the septa also distinguishes 

 it, and makes a correction necessary in the definition, which says 

 that there are always 12 tentacles in the gasterozoids. 



These specimens were dredged in great numbers from a depth 

 of 30 fathoms off Port Stephens, and the colour was a fresh pink. 

 Type specimens in the Sydney Museum. 



On Australian Fresh-water Sponges. 



By William A. Haswell, M.A., B.Sc. 



Two years ago I found a species of Fresh-water Sponge 

 inhabiting a pond near Brisbane, and sent to this Society a note 

 describing briefly the spiculation of the species, together with that 

 of a species the spicules of which were first observed by Dr. 

 Morris in the Sydney water from the Botany Eeservoirs. Shortly 

 afterwards I heard from a correspondent in Victoria that in 

 lagoons ncarBairnsdaleho had seen fresh-water sponges and would 



