and directed inwards between the water-feet which issue and extend to some length from 

 the anibulacral furrow. All these spines are, as mentioned, enveloped in a sheath of skin 

 covered with pedicellarise and forming a somewhat enlarged bag beyond their point. 



The color of the animal is somewhat variable, but yet so that the dorsal side al- 

 ways exhibits a more or less deep red tint; while the underside of the disc as well as of 

 the arms, is always paler, often quite white. On the dorsal side" of the disc the color is 

 usually less pure than on the arms, and frequently goes over to a brownish yellow. In 

 most cases there appears round the periphery of the disc a series of very conspicuous light 

 circular spots corresponding in number with the arms, and shewn by closer examination to 

 be the upper tuberculous projecting part of the above-mentioned interradial calcareous plates 

 situated between each 2 arms, and on which the spines accumulated over all the other parts 

 of the dorsal side of the disc are entirely wanting (see Tab. I, fig. 4, Tab. II, fig. 1 & 2). 

 Only in one place this light spot is absent; as its room is occupied by the strongly promi- 

 nent madreporic body (b). The color on the dorsal side of the arms goes over in different 

 individuals through several shades from a light red to a deeper coral red, and more rarely 

 to an almost purple tint. The numerous soft transverse ridges have usually, as also the 

 terminal bag of the exterior spines of the arms, a still deeper and often a nearly red violet 

 color; while the calcareous transverse ribs over the basal region are always lighter than the 

 ground color of the arms. The spines are otherwise white; but the water-feet are most 

 frequently of a pale yellowish color. 



Such is briefly the exterior appearance of this magnificent animal. It is however 

 seldom that we can see it as now viewed entire and uninjured, with all the arms in their 

 natural connexion with the disc. Not a single one of the specimens collected by me have 

 I been able to preserve entire, although every possible precaution has been employed; but 

 in all, the arms have been more or less completely separated from the disc, as was also 

 the case with the specimens hitherto preserved of the other species B. endecacnemos. In 

 this condition the animal appears like a confused heap of detached parts entangled together, 

 giving only a very imperfect idea of the splendid exterior of this star-flsh; and even the 

 specimens artificially recomposed of the B. endecacnemos in the Bergen Museum, bear so 

 evidently the stamp of manufacture, that they can not give us a completely correct represen- 

 tation of the true original appearance of the animal. I have however sometimes had oppor- 

 tunity to admire this remarkable Asteride in its full beauty at the moment when it was 

 taken up from the depths of the ocean. In a few cases I have been so fortunate, when the 

 dredge at length came up to the gunnel of the boat from the enormous depth of 300 fathoms, 

 as to see it lying in the dredge-net. whole and uninjured as it had been crawling about on 

 the bottom, with all its parts in their natural connexion. But the animal is then, as will 

 easily be understood (after being drawn up from total darkness and from the tranquil depth 

 of the ocean to the clear light of day and to the disturbed surface of the water) put into 

 so unnatural a state for all its functions of life, that even the slightest mechanical incite- 



