220 CARNEGIE INSTITUTION OF WASHINGTON. 



I was absent from the Tortugas during the greater part of this time, and did 

 not observe the swarming. To my friend Dr. Longley I am indebted for the 

 information that on July 1 he saw large numbers of worms lying on the bottom 

 among the coral reefs. While these specimens were not actually identified, 

 the fact that specimens of palolo collected after July 5 had lost their sexual 

 ends makes it evident that the worms he saw were really palolo, and that the 

 swarming occurred on July 1. 



On Recent Madreporaria of Florida, the Bahamas, and the West Indies, and on 

 Collections from Murray Island, Australia, by Thomas Wayland Vaughan. 



Dr. Mayer forwarded to the U. S. National Museum, for study and report 

 by me, a set of Recent corals and a set of bottom samples and rocks from 

 Murray Island, AustraUa. As soon as other duties permitted, reports on these 

 collections were undertaken by myself and my collaborators. The manu- 

 script on the Recent corals, now nearing completion, includes an account of the 

 collection Dr. F. Wood-Jones made in the Cocos-Keeling Islands, which he 

 has generously donated to the U. S. National Museum, and contains descrip- 

 tions and figures of about 120 species of corals from the two areas. The bot- 

 tom samples were divided and a portion of each sent to Dr. F. K. Cameron, 

 of the U. S. Bureau of Soils, who has communicated the results of physical 

 analyses. Dr. Albert Mann, of the U. S. Bureau of Plant Industry, has 

 reported on the diatoms, and Dr. Joseph A. Cushman, of the U. S. Geological 

 Survey, has furnished a preliminary report on the foraminifera, which will 

 be supplemented by the descriptions of some technically new species. Dr. 

 Marshall A. Howe, of the New York Botanical Garden, is preparing an account 

 of the coralline algse, which will soon be complete, and Mr. E. W. Shaw, of the 

 U. S. Geological Survey, is describing in detail the bottom deposits and the 

 rock specimens. 



A brief remark on the Murray Island bottom samples is appropriate here. 

 Unless it be in the relatively small percentage of material less than 2 /x in 

 diameter, there is no bacterially precipitated calcium carbonate in the samples, 

 but specimens of Coccolithophoridae ranging from 14 to 20 /i in diameter are 

 abundant, and occasionally one has a diameter of 30 /x- These belong to the 

 ^roup of forms known as Pontosphcera. Besides these, there are disks 2 to 5 m 

 in diameter, which are probably coccoliths. In the presence of these small 

 calcareous organisms and in the absence of conspicuous amounts of bacterially 

 precipitated calcium carbonate, the Murray Island reef is similar to the barrier 

 reef off Andros Island, Bahamas. One of the common organisms on the Mur- 

 ray Island reef is the foraminifer Tinoporus baccidatus, which at the station on 

 line I, 1,600 feet from shore, forms about 70 per cent of the material. 



In accordance with Dr. Mayer's suggestion that he would defray the 

 expenses of an expedition to St. Thomas, Danish West Indies, if the U. S. 

 National Museum would detail a collector, Mr. Clarence R. Shoemaker was 

 assigned to the work. He left New York for St. Thomas on June 19, and 

 returned to Washington on August 2, 1915. Unfortunately, high mnds pre- 

 vailed all the time he was on the island, making work on the outer reefs impos- 

 sible. However, he obtained about 21 species of shoal-water corals, and made 

 considerable collections of the other organisms associated with them. He 

 also made a collection of Recent land mollusca, which are being studied by 

 Dr. Bartsch for the light they may throw on the extent and age of former land 

 connection between the islands, previous to the submergence which has affected 

 all the Virgin Islands. In addition to this material, Dr. Mayer has sent to the 

 U. S. National Museum collections of corals from Barbados and Porto Rico. 

 All of these collections are being utilized in studying the Recent West Indian 

 •coral fauna. 



