THE ORANGE-DISKED ANEMONE. 
61 
ia^h and a half, or rather more. The height rarely exceeds three-fourths 
of an inch. 
Locality. 
Various points in the south and west of Great Britain and Ireland. In 
Scotland it has not been recognised. Hollows in perpendicular and over- 
hanging rocks, exposed at low water : dark tide-pools. 
Varieties. 
The variation seems to be limited to the greater or less depth of tint in 
the column. 
This most elegant species was first met with by myself 
in the neighbourhood of Tenby, where it is so abundant as 
to be quite characteristic. It has since been found in 
several other somewhat remote habitats, but nowhere in 
anything like the profusion in which it occurs in that its 
first recognised home. I am justified therefore in consider- 
ing South Wales the metropolis of the species. It occurs 
all along the south coast of Pembrokeshire, at least from 
Monkstone Point to St. Gowan’s Head ; but is more than 
usually numerous in the fine perforate caverns of St. 
Catherine’s Island, that form such an attraction to Tenby 
visitors, and in the liollows and erosions of that rich pre- 
serve of zoophytic game, — the Woolhouse Rocks. 
The Orange-disk is essentially a cave-dweller ; almost 
invariably choosing for its residence some crevice or cranny, 
or one of those little cavities made by boring mollusks, 
with which the limestone on those coasts is generally 
honeycombed. Occasionally, indeed, we find it in shallow 
pools, with a bottom of impalpable mud, the detritus pro- 
duced by the action of the waves on the surrounding rocks ; 
but in such cases it will be invariably found that the 
Actinia is attached to a hollow in the solid floor of the pool, 
protruding its body through the deposit by elongation, and 
expanding its beautiful disk on the surface. Owing to this 
