SYSTEMATIC 
ARRANGEMENT OF ACALEPH &. 
CLASS III. 
ACALEPH &. 
GELATINOUS animals, swimming freely. Stomach included in 
the parenchyme of the body, without an abdominal cavity; canals 
arising from the stomach, filled with water. Ovaries and testes in 
one and the same individual or the sexes distinct without organs 
of copulation. Vestiges of a nervous system not always distinct. 
Arrangement of parts usually quaternarian. 
OrvER I. Stphonophore. 
[Swimming Polyps without tentacles round the mouth, attached 
to a common stem of variable length, and moving freely by means 
of special swimming apparatus, with prehensile filaments, feelers, 
and protective covers or bracts, or some only of these organs, 
attached mediately or immediately to the same common stem. | 
This first order includes the Acaléphes hydrostatiques of CUVIER 
and a part of his Acaléphes simples. 
Family I. Velellide or Chondrophore. Common body, sup- 
ported by a cartilaginous’ lamina, which is cellular internally. 
The part of the body which faces upward is supported by a 
disc, which in Porpita is even in some degree calcareous, and con- 
[1 The disc contains horny substance, not cartilage, according to LEuCKART. | 
