110 THE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 



A second very remarkable larva, characterised by the great elongation of all the 

 spines of the carapace, especially the antero-laterals, I refer, with less confidence, to the 

 Lysioerichthus group. The single specimen, which is shown in PI. XL fig. 14, was taken 

 in the tow-net off Kandavu Island, Fiji. 



Lysiosquilla maculata [Erichthus duvaucellei) Guerin. — The largest Erichthus in the 

 Challenger collection is shown in profile in PL X. fig. 7, and from below in PI. XI. 

 fio-. 4. The collection contains numerous specimens which differ from each other only 

 in the length of the dorsal spine, which is often entirely absent, sometimes present but very 

 short, and occasionally well developed, as in the specimen from which fig. 7 was drawn. 

 The various specimens are so much alike in all other particulars that I cannot believe 

 that the length of this spine can be taken as an index of specific identity. It is probable 

 that in the older larva at least it is often broken ofi" in moulting, and that the difi'erences 

 in its length are accidental. 



The largest specimens, which are more than one inch long, were collected between 

 Api and Cape York, between Admiralty Island and Japan, in the Straits of Mendino, 

 and at other points in the West Pacific. It is apparently the same as the Erichthus 

 duvaucellei which Guerin obtained in the Gulf of Bengal, and Claus in the Indian Ocean. 

 Although Claus states (p. 135) his opinion that it is a Squilla larva, it is clearly a 

 Lysioerichthus, closely related to the various larvae which have been described. In the 

 larger specimens the integument of the carapace and of the abdominal somites is soft, 

 flexible and leather-like, as in Lysiosquilla maculata, and the edges of the somites of 

 the hind body exhibit the transverse dark bands which are so characteristic of this species. 

 The inner spine of the basal prolongation of the uropod is longer than the outer, a relation 

 which is somewhat exceptional among the Lysioerichthus larvae, and also among the adult 

 Lysiosquilla^, although the adult Lysiosquilla maculata is one of the exceptional species, 

 having the inner spine longer than the outer. The raptorial claw of the larva is 

 long and slender, with traces under the cuticle of eight marginal spines, and as the 

 adult female Lysiosquilla maculata has seven or eight, while this number is increased in 

 the adult male to nine or ten, I cannot doubt that this large, flat, soft, transversely striped, 

 widely distributed larva, is the young of the largest of the Stomatopoda, Lysiosquilla 

 'maculata, which is also flat, transverselj- striped, soft, and very widely distributed. 



The Larva of the genus Coronida. 



I have shown that we are led by the comparative study of the adult Stomatopoda, 

 to believe that Lysiosquilla and Squilla are the divergent descendants of a Protosquilla- 

 like form, with an acutely pointed rostrum, and minute uropods, and with the base of the 

 dactylus of the raptorial claw dilated as in Protosquilla and Gonodactylus, but armed with 

 marginal spines, and with the hind body depressed as it is in Squilla and Lysiosquilla^ 



