54- POPULAll HISTORY OF THE AQUARIUM. 



Laomedea GELATIXOSA. 



This polypiferous animal is^ like the former, provided with 

 cup-shaped cells placed on ringed, springy necks, protecting 

 the polypi which fill them. As the cups are very trans- 

 parent, a favourable opportunity is given for observing the 

 economy of the structure. A slender and transparent tube 

 springs up from creeping, thread-like roots, sending out 

 branches at intervals on both sides. These branches are 

 ringed, or constricted in such a manner as to appear tied in 

 as it were by very fine threads, at places close to each other, 

 so as to make the rings very narrow\ At the end of each 

 branch is a miniature wine-glass, or hyaline cell, perfectly 

 transparent and beautifully shaped, containing the polype, 

 in which each branch of the fleshy centre terminates. The 

 flesh is jelly-like, hollow in the centre, and runs like an 

 inner pipe through the stem and branches of thepolypidom, 

 until it reaches the cell at the end of each. In the hol- 

 low part of the fleshy pipe is a fluid containing moving 

 granules, the precise nature of which is not accurately as- 

 certained. 



When the fleshy tube reaches the eiul of each branch, and 

 arrives at the neck of the cell, it passes through a perfora- 

 tion which exists in a partition which runs across, near the 



