FAUNA OF THE INLAND SEA OF SINQGORA. 101 



attached to the aiipenclages of Linitdns, is probably no more than 

 an occasional au<l involuntary visitor to the lake-system ; another 

 lives on mollusc shells inhabited by hermit-crabs, while a third 

 was dredged ajiparently unattached. None ot these species are pro- 

 bablv related to the charai'tcristie loriiis of Indian backwaters and 

 estuaries. 



Larire Medusae of various families are often carried into the 

 month of the lake by tidal currents, but soon perish in bracklsli water, 

 in which the o'dy species that survive, so far as the Tale Sap is con- 

 ceineil, are small and colourless. One of tliese is the medusae of 

 Campamdina ceijlonensis. the life-historj' of w Inch was recently worked 

 out at Calcutta by Major R. E. Lloyd. ' It is a marine foi-m that 

 can live in water of comparatively low salJnitj' and is therefore able 

 to make its wny inland in the deltsi of the Ganges for considerable 

 distances. 



Only two Hydroids were observed in the Tale Sap, a species of 

 Pe rvjonvmu !t . which forms shaggy and conspicuous fringes on fishing- 

 .>(akes, and a small and transparent Campanulariid, not uncommon on 

 the shells of molluscs and on dead palm leaves that had fallen into 

 the water. 



The fauna of the outer lake of the Tale Sap system is thus 

 that of a true marine lake and is strictly comparable with that of 

 the Chilka Lake. Very little is at jn-esent known about seasonal 

 changes in physical conditions in the Tale Sap, but it is clear that 

 considerable differences in respect to such changes exist between it 

 and the Ciiilka Lake. Variation in salinity, for example, seems to be 

 even more inconstant in the Tale Sa[>, and the fact that the rivers 

 which enter it do so at intervals along tiie whole length of one side. 

 rather than only in a comparatively small area at one end, must have 

 considerable bearing on this point. General Ij^ speaking, the fauna of 

 tiie outer lake resembles that of the outer channel of the Chilka 

 Lake, but there are important differences that cannot be fully estimated 

 as yet, and oidy a comparatively small nundjer of the species are 

 idijntical. I hope to publish later, when at any rate the greater part 

 of my collections have been worked out by specialists, a fuller account 



1 Lloyd, liev. Ind. Miis., v^.i. Xli, pp. 52-57, pis v-vii (191G). 

 Vol.. II. i>i:c. iiMi;. 



