162 
ANTHEAD^. 
)S. Sulphurea. As the preceding, except that the tentacles are pale 
delicate lemon-yellow, with the slightest shade of green ; lilac-tipped. 
(Herm : S. W, Ventnor.) In the Herm specimen, the tentacles were 
scarlet at the foot. 
y. Alaiastrina. Column and disk light translucent olive; tentacles 
wholly clear waxy white. (Ventnor. Torquay.) 
5. Rustica. Column and disk dull brown ; tentacles ash-grey, generally 
with a paler line down the back. 
e. Pwnicea. Tentacles mahogany-red. {Gaerbier.) 
Antliea cereiis is one of our most abundant species, at 
least on the south and west coasts of England and Scot- 
land, and probably all round Ireland. Rapp and Grabe 
indicate it as common in the Mediterranean and Adriatic 
seas ; but the omission of any allusion to it by Muller or 
by Sars implies that it is unknown in the North Sea. Its 
abundance where it occurs, its habit of congregating in 
numbers, and its favourite resort, — shallow pools within 
tide-marks, protected only by a few inches of water from 
the full glare of the sun, as well as its size and conspicuous 
colours, — all conspire to make it familiar to the most cur- 
sory observer. It would, probably, be one of the first 
species of the whole race to become popularly known ; and 
hence it is not sm’prising that old Rondeletius should take 
notice of it in the middle of the sixteenth century, includ- 
ing it in his “ Libri de Piscibus Marinis,” by the deserip- 
tive epithet of Urtica cinerea. 
The late Dr. Johnston separated the genus from Actinia 
in his “ Brit. Zooph.” Ed. 1 ; giving it the name of Antliea, 
from av6o<i, a flower. The specific name of cereus seems to 
have been appropriated to it in accoi»dance with a fancy 
which Ellis had of naming the Actinioids after many- 
petaled flowers , — cereus being the name of one of the Cacti, 
now a genus. The waxy appearance of the tentacles in 
some of the varieties may have influenced him in the 
selection. The English name I have formed for it alludes 
to the habitually open condition of the disk. 
