276 " ENDEAVOUR " SCIENTIFIC RESULTS. 



Dynamena pulchella, D'Orbigny, has usually been considered 

 .-another synonym, but Nutting, who regarded it as identical 

 ^th *S'. furcata, Trask, treats it as distinct. The identity of 

 D. pulchella and S. furcata cannot now, I think, be maintained ; 

 the former is, as Fraser has pointed out, much and irregu- 

 larly branched, and attains a length of a quarter of a metre, 

 while its hydrothecse differ from those of S. operculata only in 

 having the two teeth about equal. S. furcata, on the other 

 hand, is shown by the accounts of Clark, Torrey, Fraser, and 

 Stechow to be a dwarf unbranched form of the Desmoscyphus- 

 type. There is no doubt that D. pulchella is identical with 

 S. operculata, or at least very closely allied to it ; as for S. 

 furcata, I cannot see any definite distinction between it and 

 S. minima. 



Billard regards S. crinis, Allman, as identical with S. 

 operculata, having found on examination of Allman's types 

 that the form of the hydrothecse and the gonothecse 

 is the same as in the latter species ; and he remarks that 

 it suffices to see Allman's figures to recognise the identity 

 of the two. This, however, can only apply to the minute 

 structure, the habit of S. crinis being very different from 

 that of S. operculata. In the latter, as already mentioned, 

 there is no distinction between stem and branches, all 

 the ramifications of the colony being alike. In S. crinis, 

 according to Allman's figure, there is a main stem four or five 

 inches in height, with several principal branches, from which 

 arise numerous tufted dichotomously divided branchlets. 

 On the stem and main branches the hydrothecse are from 

 about five to fifteen times as distant from each other as are 

 those on the small branchlets. Dr. Kirkpatrick, who has 

 kindly examined the type for me, states that there is a 

 distinct main stem from origin to apex, consisting of long 

 smooth intemodes apparently without or with only one pair 

 of hydrothecse. These peculiarities seem sufficient to estab- 

 ■Ush the claim of S. crinis to rank, if not as a separate species, 

 at least as a distinct variety of S operculata, the latter view 

 being taken by Dr. Kirkpatrick. 



Locs. — Twenty miles east of King Island, Bass Strait. 



Off Devonport, Tasmania. 



Ten miles north of Circular Head, Tasmania. 



Sertularia maplestonei, Bale. 



.Sertularia maplestonei, Bale, Biological Results " Endea- 

 vour," ii., 1, 1914, p. 16 (s3monymy). 



