68 POPULAE. HISTORY OF THE AQUARIUM. 



veted centre, but displaying in themselves beauties greater 

 than any they could hide. 



Or even if we could transport the branching and netted 

 Gorgoma flahellum, or '^Venus's Ean/^ from its native 

 haunts in the West Indies, and see its branches incrusted 

 with animated fibre and lively polypes waving in the rippled 

 waters, and crowning the rockwork of an Aquarium, we 

 should be adding a desirable variation to the already varied 

 picture. But notwithstanding the fact of broken pieces 

 being dredged up near our coasts, it appears certain that 

 Venus^s Tan has never been seen living in this country. 

 Those species that we can point to as our own, although 

 interesting, are not so beautiful as those which are met 

 with abroad. The same principle however may be observed 

 throughout, — a branched, tree-like form rooted to the rock 

 by a spreading disc ; through the stem and every branch a 

 horny or bony central axis ; axis covered with a fleshy 

 incrustation; flesh containing, at intervals, polypes in cells. 



GORGONIA VERRUCOSA 



Is shrub-like. It grows to the height of a foot, and spreads 

 out like a fan to an equal width. It is branched; but as 

 the branches do not cross into each other, as in Gorgonia 



