268 R. HARTMEYER. 



Solan der. The consequence of this mistake is that the specific name 

 Jicus has been retained until the present day in the ascidian literature, 

 but lias also been used at the same time by writers on sponges. I have 

 already shown that the name ficus cannot be maintained for an 

 ascidian, but must fall to the sponge. Savigny does not discuss the 

 sponge further. 



Another new name for the ascidian was introduced in the same year 

 by Lamarck in his "Histoire naturelle des Animaux sans 

 Vertebres." Although he recognises the genus Ajdidium founded by 

 Savigny, he calls the species Aplidmm suhlohatum. "Why he should 

 introduce this new specific name, although he had in the year 1815 de- 

 signated the species Alcyonium pulmonaria, is not very easy to see. 

 Moreover he retains the sponge in the genus Alcyonium and keeps the 

 name A. Jiciforme. 



The year 1816 therefore fixes the time from whence onwards the two 

 species finally remain separate. Ellis' form is recognised as ascidian, 

 whilst it is not until many years later that Alcyonium Jlc us is regarded 

 as a sponge and placed first in the genus Suheritcs, later in Hcdi- 

 chondria, finally in the genus Ficulinc(, which was established specially 

 for this species. With this definite separation of the two species only 

 the further history of the ascidian will continue to interest us here, 

 but before proceeding, I should like to consider briefly Lendenf eld's 

 paper on the "Clavulina der Adria" published in 1896. A sum- 

 mary of the literature on Ficidina Jicus is given in this paper, which 

 contains some errors in the old references previous to the year 1816, which 

 may be here corrected. In the first place there is placed amongst the 

 synonyms the Alcyonium pulmonis instar lohatuvi of Ellis. I can only 

 suppose that Lendenfeld had no personal acquaintance with Ellis' 

 work, or he would never have regarded the figure which Ellis gives as 

 that of a sponge. As the earliest literature reference Bauhin and 

 Cherler, 1651 (not 1650 !) are quoted. This is not correct. Bauhin 

 and Cherler indeed are based on Imperato and even give an extract 

 from the work of the latter. I have already referred to the reference 

 to Eay (1690), which also contains an error. A further mistake, 

 finally, is that Lendenfeld ascribes the authorship of the name ficits 

 to Linn?eus instead of to Pallas. 



I now proceed with the history of the ascidian. After Savigny's 

 species had been placed, in the year 1816, in his genus Aplidium, as 

 Aplidium, ficus, the specific name ficus was prevalent for 30 years. 

 Only in quite isolated instances the synonymous specific name suhlo- 

 hcdum, derived from Lamarck, appeared along with it. On the other hand 

 the generic name was changed repeatedly. This is explained by the fact 



