280 BULLETIN 82, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



that had formed part of an interesting lot of echinoderms secured for the Museum of 

 Comparative Zoology by Dr. Thomas Barbour. Dr. Clark graciously remarked that 

 the specimen had been identified for him by the author, whom he permitted to make 

 notes upon it. 



On July 15, 1908, I recorded and gave notes upon seven specimens identified as 

 Tropiometra afra that had been dredged in Sagami Bay by Alan Owston in his yacht 

 the Golden Hind and subsequently purchased and deposited in the United States 

 National Museum by Frank Springer. I remarked that I could not find any tangible 

 differences between the Japanese form described in 1895 by Hara as macrodiscus and 

 the Australian afra described by Hartlaub two (in reality five) years earlier, of which 

 the National Museum possesses a dried specimen from the South Pacific. I noted 

 that the latter agrees in all particulars with the Japanese specimens, and has rather 

 more cirrus segments than does Hartlaub's type specimen, these numbering about 33, 

 as given in Hara's description of macrodiscus. In a paper published on August 25, 

 1908, I wrote under the heading Antedon macrodiscus that "The affinities of this re- 

 markable species are with Antedon afra Hartlaub, from which, however, it is quite 

 distinct, the length of the lower pinnules being especially remarkable. It is strange 

 that specimens of these two species should be so rare m collections. I have only been 

 able to examine one of each." The two specimens referred to were the specimen of 

 macrodiscus recorded by Dr. H. L. Clark in April 1908, and a specimen of afra in the 

 United States National Museum labeled "South Pacific" that had been collected by 

 the United States Exploring Exedition. 



In 1909 I recorded under the name Tropiometra afra and gave notes upon a 

 magnificent specimen of tliis comatulid from the Korean Straits and also gave notes 

 on another from Misaki which, although the fact is not mentioned, was the one 

 recorded in 1908 by Dr. H. L. Clark. I wrote that, judging from Hartlaub's type 

 specimen of afra from Bowen and a second from Bowen here recorded and described, 

 it would seem that the large and rugged specimens from Japan, the macrodiscus of 

 Hara, with their more numerous cirrus segments, were certainly specifically distinct. 

 But a specimen taken by the United States Exploring Expedition in the "South 

 Pacific" (probably Australia) so unites the two forms that we can not but consider 

 them identical. I noted that the number of cirrus segments in this specimen and 

 in the one from Misald are approximately the same, thus rendering the separation 

 of the two impossible so far as this character is concerned, and I could find no difl'er- 

 ences in the arm and pinnule structure. I added that the Australian material avail- 

 able is scanty and unsatisfactory, and more perfect specimens may possibly show 

 some grounds for the recognition of two forms; but it certainly cannot be done as 

 matters stand now, and, considering the enormous range of the only other species of 

 the genus (carinata, considered as including all the smaller forms with carinate arms), 

 it appears most probable our present conclusions are correct. In my memoir on the 

 Recent crinoids of Australia published in 1911, I included macrodiscus as a synonym 

 under afra, saying that it is common in the Korean Straits and abundant at Misaki. 



In 1912 I recorded, under the name Tropiometra macrodiscus, two specimens I 

 had examined at the Hambm-g Museum in 1910 and said that I was now convinced 

 I had been wrong in placing Hara's macrodiscus in the synonymy of Hartlaub's afra; 

 macrodiscus is a stouter and larger form than afra, v\'ith longer and heavier cirri and 



