JIO BULLETIN 82, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



In 1894 Professor Bell described from the Macclesfield Bank and figured a new 

 species of Antedon which he placed in Carpenter's "Spinijera group" and called 

 Antedon bassett-smiihi. He also recorded this species from the same region mider 

 the names Adinometra simplex and Actinometra maculata. 



In 1895 Professor Koehler discussed this species and mentioned that it is the 

 same as Lutken's tenax. He also erroneously quoted Carpenter as saying that nigra 

 is also a synonym of stelligera. He recorded a specunen from the Bay of Amboina, 

 which, however, is more properly referable to nigra. 



Chadwick in 1904 recorded a specimen of Actinometra notata from Ceylon. 



In 1905 Minckert discussed in detail the articulations of and regeneration in 

 this species. 



In my first revision of the comatulids published in 1907 I had considerable 

 trouble in placing Bell's Antedon bassett-smiihi. It obviously did not belong m the 

 Spinifera group in which it was described. As its reference to that group impUed 

 the occurrence of well developed side and covering plates along the pmnule ambu- 

 lacra, it seemed to me m.ost probable that it belonged to the group which I had very 

 recently designated as the Multicolor group; that is, to the multibrachiate species 

 related to Neometra multicolor, now included in the family Calometridae. Accord- 

 ingly I assigned it to this group under the nam.e of Calometra bassett-smithi. 



In the year following, however, I discovered that it could not belong here, and 

 decided that it was in reality a species of the Palmata group, which I assumed was 

 "obvious from the shape of the lower pinnules as given in the plate." At the same 

 time I called attention to the fact that the original description does not agree with 

 the figure in respect to the number of the arms or of the cirri or the length of the 

 first pinnule. 



In his original description of Antedon bassett-smithi, Professor Bell had remarked 

 on the "extraordinary divergencies exhibited by the syzygies of this species," and 

 added that this form "will severely shake our faith in the value of the site of the 

 syzygy as an aid in specific diagnosis." In 1909 I found that, had Bell referred 

 the species to the Stelligera group of Actinometra instead of to the Spinifera group of 

 Antedon, he would have seen that the arrangement of the syzygies was quite normal, 

 and further that the specimen described under the name of Antedon bassett-smithi 

 was none other than an example of Comatella stelligera. This was reasserted in 1912 

 and was confirmed by an examination of the type specimen in the British Museum 

 in 1910, as recorded in 1913. 



In a detailed study of the various species assigned to the genus Actinometra it 

 was found that Carpenter's Actinometra notata, originally described in the Paucicirra 

 group, was in reality a synonym of his previously described Actinometra stelligera, 

 the type of the Stelligera group. This discovery was made possible through the study 

 of the comatuhds contained in the Copenhagen Museum, which included the first 

 specimens of this species which I had been able to examine, and it was announced, 

 together with the fact that Antedon bassett-smithi is also a synonym of this species, 

 in the account of this collection pubhshed in 1909. 



In my account of the recent crinoids of AustraUa published in 1911 I recorded a 

 specimen of this species in the Australian Museum at Sydney which was labeled 



