4 NOTES AND COMMENTS [sULY 
The Scaly Squid. 
SomME four years ago Professor Joubin of Rennes astonished the 
scientific world by the announcement that the Prince of Monaco 
had obtained from the stomach of a sperm whale the trunk of a 
large cephalopod covered with scales. Some light has been thrown 
upon this curious structure in a recent paper by Dr. Einar Lénnberg 
in the results of “Svenska expeditionen till Magellanslindern.” 
This author describes a very complete example of Onychoteuthis ingens, 
in which the pallial surface had a peculiar warty appearance. In 
transverse section there were visible, between the muscular layers 
and the epidermis, large flat papillae, some 4 mm. in diameter by 
1mm. thick. In the spirit specimens the skin had sunk down 
between the papillae, giving the surface of the body the appearance of 
irregular tiles paving an old-fashioned street. On microscopic ex- 
amination each papilla is found to be made up of a parenchymatous- 
looking mass of connective tissue. Dr. Lénnberg points out that 
if the integument were removed, as had been done in Joubin’s 
specimen by the digestive action of the cachalot, the papillae would 
present the appearance of the scales described by that author. 
Regarding the function of this organ Lénnberg suggests that it may 
be an adaptation “to hydrostatic pressure when the animals descend to 
great depths;” and he mentions that a gelatinous subcutaneous struc- 
ture has been observed in other deep-sea cephalopods, such as Allo- 
posus by Joubin, and in large species of Ommastrephes by Steenstrup. 
Echinoderms at the British Museum. 
UNDER the new Director, additions and improvements continue to be 
introduced at the Natural History Museum, London, with no less 
rapidity than in the days of Sir William Flower. The gallery devoted 
to recent echinoderms and worms, which groups are in the hands of 
Mr. F. J. Bell, has for some little time been changing for the better. 
Several examples of the softer-bodied forms, such as cannot be dis- 
played in the dry state, are now beautifully mounted in spirit, while, 
in the case of the holothurians, the form and colouring of the living 
animal is shown by a series of sketches of the living holothurian of 
Ceylon, prepared under the direction of the late Dr. Ondaatje. There 
are two charming water-colours, we believe by Mr. C. Berjeau, of the 
rosy feather-star and the holothurian, Cucwmaria crocea. Similar 
drawings adorn the coral gallery, and are a vast improvement on the 
usual class of wall-diagrams one sees in museums. Dried holothurians 
are not forgotten, for, as every schoolboy knows, they form an im- 
portant article of diet in the far East under the name of Trepang; 
