224 BULLETIN - 70, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



The type of this species is in the Museum d'Histoire Naturelle (E 792 M. M. 

 Hombron et Jacquinot, 1847, alcohol). See antea. Perrier considered the type 

 locality to be Port Famine, Magellan Strait. 



Tun dried specimens from Darwin Harbor, Choiseul Sound, Falkland Islands 

 No. 2623 Mus. ('(imp. Zool.) apparently belong to this species. The smaller meas- 

 ures R 18 mm., r 6 mm.; the larger It 48 mm., r 13 mm. In the smaller example 

 the abactinal skeleton is clearly visible and consists of a weak, irregular reticulum 

 resembling the condition in A. pediceUaris as figured by Koehlcr (1923, pi. 5, figs. 1 

 and -1 ) and closely similar to that of the type specimen of minuta. Most of the super- 

 omarginals carry one spinelet and the inferomarginals two, while scattered along the 

 intermarginal channel and inside the furrow margin are rather numerous, lanceolate 

 straight pedicellariae two-thirds the length of the superomarginal spinelets. In the 

 Larger specimen, however, the abactinal integument has thickened and conceals the 

 skeleton which is quite weak and irregular as in Koehler's Plate 5, Figure 1, alluded 

 to above. The proportions are about as in Figure 4. There are a few actinal plates 

 and spines at the base of the ray and the adoral carina is composed of three pairs 

 of contiguous adambulacrals, the first pair larger than second, and the second largei 

 than third. The superomarginal spines have been mostly absorbed; pedicellariae as. 

 in the small example. A third specimen (No. 2624) carries a cluster of young. 



Sixteen specimens from Port Stanley, Falkland Islands, collected in 1927 by 

 Dr. W. L. Schmitt. These are evidently conspecific with the Darwin Harbor examples. 

 A well-hardened alcoholic example (R48 mm.) resembles the Kalyptasterias conjerta 

 figured by Koehlcr (1923, pi. 4, figs. 3 and 4). The abactinal plates are slender, 

 delicate, and form an irregular reticulum, with very large meshes, and are entirely 

 hidden, until dried, by the soft pulpy integument. Dorsal spinelets few and widely 

 scattered; only a few abactinal crossed and straight pedicellariae. Superomarginal 

 plates normal, not massive, each with one blunt, terete, slender spinelet, 1 to 1.5 mm. 

 long; inferomarginals with two, decidedly stouter and longer spines; actinal plates 

 with one spine, slightly smaller, the series extending two-thirds length of ray, each 

 spine forming with the inferomarginal spines a transverse series of three. Numerous, 

 rather thickly lanceolate, subobtuse straight pedicellariae, decidedly longer than 

 broad are scattered on the marginal and actinal plates, in the intermarginal channel 

 and along edge of furrow. No associated miss pedicellariae, except near end of ray 

 and there only a few. [In Sporasterias antarctica the superomarginala are normally 

 surrounded by crossed pedicellariae, and the inferomarginal plates carry at least a 

 few on the intermarginal side of the spines.] 



Another lot of nine from Port Stanley (April lfi, 1927) differs in having numerous 

 small capitate abactinal spinelets, and fairly numerous abactinal (but not marginal) 

 crossed pedicellariae; straight pedicellariae scattered over abactinal surface and 

 distributed laterally and actinally without associated crossed pedicellariae; integu- 

 ment thick, pulpy, in alcohol. When dried a specimen would pass for an aberrant 

 Sporasterias antarctica, with weak dorsal skeleton. One specimen carries a thick 

 mass of eggs in the oral concavity. 



Fourteen specimens from near Teal Inlet, Falklands, also collected by Doctor 

 Schmitt, do not belong to this species but are mentioned because they have the thick 

 dorsal integument and abactinal spinelets of the above lot. When dried they 



