SILICIOUS AND HORNY SPONGES WILSON. 445 



Over 30 genera have been enrolled in this family, but with respect 

 to several there is little reason why they should be put here. With 

 the exclusion of these, a good group is left centering round such 

 forms as Axinella, Phakellia, Acanthella, mid Auletta, which seem to 

 be related, through Raspailia and Axinella-like species with a few 

 acanthostyles (Axinella acanthifera George and Wilson, for instance, 

 which I now think would best be transferred to Raspailia), to the 

 Ectyoninae (Dendy's original position, see George and Wilson, 1919, 

 p. 161). Hallmann, 1916, 1917, and Dendy, 19215 have recently dis- 

 cussed a number of the genera and their classification. 



Genus AXINYSSA Lendenfeld (1897). 



Axinyssa Lendenfeld, 1897, p. 116. 



Axinellidae with conuli ; skeletal spicules, oxeas. No microscleres. 



Lendenfeld's diagnosis, 1897, reads " massive axinellidae," but the 

 species described below has a large apical cloacal cavity. Other 

 species of the genus have been described or recorded by Kirkpatrick, 

 1903 (pp. 245, 246), and by Topsent, 1906 (p. 7). 



Thiele, 1903 (p. 934), thinks it advisable to confine the axinellidae 

 with oxeas (amphioxeas) to the following three genera: Dactylella 

 Thiele, Axinyssa Lendenfeld, Phycopsis Carter. This rule, if rigidly 

 followed out, would necessitate the removal from Axinella, and 

 possibly other genera, of certain species that have been placed there. 

 A distinction should probably be made between equiended and in- 

 equiended oxeas. The latter form is close to the style, and species 

 with it might well be left in Axinella. 



AXINYSSA ACULEATA, new species. 



Plate 42, fig. 8 ; plate 49, fig. 9. 



Two specimens, one (dried) from station 5254, the other from 

 station 5641. The illustrations were made from the former specimen, 

 which happened to be studied first. 



Both specimens massive, attached below, with a large apical 

 cloacal cavity, which is coextensive or nearly so with upper surface of 

 sponge. In the dried specimen the horizontal diameter of the whole 

 sponge is 140 mm., height 120 mm. ; cloacal cavity 70-100 mm. wide 

 and about 60 mm. deep. The other specimen is something over half 

 as large, with a cloacal cavity that is relatively somewhat wider. 

 Sponge firm but not hard. Color, brown. 



Both surfaces, outer and cloacal, covered with minute, sharp spine- 

 like conuli, which in general are connected with fine ridges; conuli 



