COLLEUTED BY MR. BOURNE. 32? 



before I had tliouglit of sending the whole collection of Echinoderms 

 to Prof. Bell. Hence they do not appear in the above report. 



Mr. Sladen writes to me as follows : — ''The two star-fishes you sent 

 are very fine examples of Nymj^haster protentus, which I described 

 in the Eeport ' Challenger ' Asteroidea. They are larger than the 

 type. One differs in having occasionally a small pedicellaria on the 

 marginal plates like those on the abactinal plates. Their presence 

 in your specimens is probably due to age. The second specimen 

 differs in having a small spiniform granule, the largest about 1 mm. 

 in length, on the infero-marginal plates on the inner two thirds of 

 the ray, and a similar but smaller granule on a few of the innermost 

 supero-marginal plates, not more than five or six being present in 

 each iuterbrachial arc. This is to the eye a striking difference, 

 but I do not consider it to be essentially of any great importance. 

 I therefore shrink from ranking the example as a distinct variety of 

 Nymphaster protentus on the basis of a single specimen, for the 

 character in question is one subject to much variation in other forms, 

 and may be sexual.'^ Since I received this letter Canon Norman 

 has called my attention to the fact i\i2Ju Nymphaster protentus, Sladen, 

 is, in its younger condition, indistinguishable from Pentagonaster 

 subspinosus of the "Blake^^ Expedition described by Perrier in 1884 

 [Mem. sur Jes Etoiles de mer recueilles dans la mer des Antilles et 

 le Golfe du Mexiqtie, Nouv. Archiv. du Museum d'Hist. Nat., ser. 2, 

 tom. vi, p. 234, plate vi, fig. 1). Perrier's specific name must 

 therefore be adopted, and the range of the species is thus consider- 

 ably extended. By the " Blake " Expedition it was dredged in 

 163 — 209 fathoms, off Havana, Barbadoes, and Cariacon ; by the 

 " Challenger " at Station 3, south-west of the Canary Islands, lat. 

 25° 45' N., long. 20° 14' W., 1525 fath. ; by the " Flying Fox " off 

 the south-west of Ireland in 315 fath., and by the '' Eesearch." 

 For a description of the " Flying Fox " specimens, described as 

 Nymphaster protentus, see Prof. Bell's paper, Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., 

 ser. 6, vol. iv, p. 434. 



G. C. B. 



