BARBADOS-ANTIGUA REPORTS 117 



the primaries are deep brownish-green, light only at the tips, but 

 there is much diversity in the relative proportions of green and 

 pale fawn-color. 



Holotype labelled onl^^ "Barbados", but Professor Nutting 

 tells me that "in all probability it came from a depth of be- 

 tween 30 and 100 fms." 



The discovery of Pseudoboletia in the West Indian region is 

 certainly one of the most noteworthy results of the Barbados- 

 Antigua Expedition, for the genus is not known on the western 

 coast of tropical America and is really characteristic of the 

 Indo-Pacific fauna. On June 10, 1904, the "Scotia" took two 

 specimens of a Pseudoboletia in 40 fms. off the island of Ascen- 

 sion, in mid-Atlantic but well south of the equator. It is re- 

 markable that the new species from Barbados is not very close to 

 this Atlantic species,^ which has five pairs of pores to an arc and 

 banded actinal spines, but is so very close to P. macidata of the 

 Philippines that one hesitates to call them distinct. The follow- 

 ing differences however warrant keeping them separate, at least 

 until more material is available. In macidata, the inner primary 

 tubercle of the ambulacra appears first on the seventh, eighth or 

 ninth plate from the ocular, in specimens 52-55 mm. in diameter, 

 while in occidentalis it occurs first on the tenth-twelfth plate; 

 this is not an important character and will probably prove in- 

 constant and unreliable. In macidata the periproct is covered bj- 

 about 30 plates and the oculo-genital ring is more granulated, 

 than in occidentalis. The primary spines of the midzone in 

 maculata are markedly flattened, with bluntly chisel-shaped tips 

 (though with a terminal concavity), and are 14r-16 mm. long. 

 Their color too, green at base and red-purple or reddish at tip, is 

 quite different from the pale colors of occidentalis. 



In view of the insignificance of these differences, the question 

 naturally arises whether the Barbados specimen was not acci- 

 dentally brought from the East Indian region (or possibly from 

 Hawaii). Professor Nutting assures me there is no doubt what- 

 ever that the specimen at hand was collected at Barbados. It is 

 not inconceivable that a small specimen of macidata might have 

 been brought on a very foul ship bottom through the Panama 



* Koehler called the specimens from Ascension P. maculata but they really represent 

 quite a diflferent species, which I have proposed (1912. Mem. C. Z., 34, p. 344) to 

 ■call atlantica. 



