NO. 2286. THE NEW COPEPOD FAMILY SPHYRIIDAE— WILSON. 567 



shape, forming the sphyra or hammer, from the center of whose an- 

 terior surface projects the head. Neck smooth, of medium diameter 

 and often enlarged posteriorly. Trunk greatly enlarged trans- 

 versely, flattened dorsoventrally, smooth or pitted according to the 

 contraction of the dorso ventral muscles; no abdomen but a pair of 

 knob-like anal laminae. A pair of posterior processes j^rofusely and 

 dichotomously branched; egg strings long and straight; eggs multi- 

 seriate. In young females two pairs of antennae, two pairs of max- 

 illae, one pair of maxillipeds, no swimming legs. In older females 

 the appendages degenerate into liiiobs or entirely disappear. 



Internal generic characters of female. — Mouth tube at the extreme 

 anterior margin of the head, inclined ventrally ; esophagus entering 

 the stomach on the antero ventral surface; stomach without lateral 

 processes; intestine narrowed in the neck and widened in the trunk, 

 where it develops a complicated system of processes; rectum short, 

 opening between the anal laminae; cement glands strongly curved, 

 close to the posterolateral walls of the genital segment, indistinctly 

 jointed; ovaries close to the body wall on either side and reaching 

 from the anterior end of the trunk to the anterior end of the cement 

 glands; oviducts profusely coiled, the convolutions separated by 

 strands of dorsoventral muscles; chitinogen layer thickest in the an- 

 terior part of the trunk, outside of the oviduct coils. 



External generic characters of 'male. — General form an elongated 

 ellipsoid, with the cephalothorax attached to one end on a level with 

 the dorsal surface and covered with a minute carapace. Body folded 

 upon itself very much as in the Lernaeopod genus Clavellisa and 

 thoroughly fused, without distinction of parts or segmentation; 

 mouth tube, appendages, and a genital process on the ventral surface. 

 Two pairs of antennae on the anterior margin of the tiny carapace; 

 two pairs of maxillae: maxillipeds slender and chelate, their basal 

 joints fused. 



Internal generic characters of male. — Esophagus not much inclined 

 to the body axis, but quite long and entering the stomach at the ante- 

 rior end. Stomach close to the dorsal surface of the head, passing 

 insensibly into the intestine which follows around the curve of the 

 body, and then turns forward and opens at the anus just behind the 

 maxillipeds. Testes paired, between the stomach-intestine and the 

 dorsal wall of the head, opposite the bases of the maxillipeds; sperm 

 duct coiled backward and forward twice between the intestine and 

 the lateral body wall, the last time forming a fairly large spermato- 

 phore receptacle. 



Type of the genus. — S-phyrion laevigatwm Guerin Meneville. 

 {Sphyrion, o-cpuptov, a little hammer.) 



