WEST INDIAN STARFISHES 65 



The following notes were made by me several years ago, on 

 the type specimen preserved in the Museum of Comparative 

 Zoology. 



Rays unusually long for this group. Principal dorsal plates 

 are small, lobate or cross-shaped, separated by numerous rather 

 large papular pores; they bear close pencils of rather long, slen- 

 der spinules, ten or twelve or more in each pencil. The spinules 

 of the plates in the interradial areas are more slender and di- 

 vergent. 



On the actinal side the outlines of the interactinal plates are 

 not distinguishable ; each plate bears a group or pencil of four to 

 six very slender, long, acute spinules, longer than those of the 

 dorsal plates. Marginal plates very prominent, but not very 

 large; not flat. Each bears a terminal close cluster of long, 

 slender spinules, like those of the interactinal plates. The ad- 

 ambulacral plates bear a comb of about four or five slender, 

 acute, regularly placed spinules in the furrow-series, and a 

 group of three to six similar spinules on the outer surface. 



The type was dredged by the Blake Expedition, off Barbados. 



Genus Stegnaster Sladen. Type, 8. wesseli Per. 



Stegnaster Sladen, Voy. Cball., xxx, p. xxxiv, 376, 1889. Fisher, op. eit., p. 

 254, 1911b. Verrill, Revision of Asterininse, p. 481, May, 1913. 



Form depressed, pentagonal or stellate, with very short rays ; 

 margin thin. 



Adambulacral spines form a continuous webbed series, the in- 

 dividual combs of three to five being united together ; no spin- 

 ules on the outer surface. Dorsal and ventral plates imbricated 

 and, like their interstices, covered with a finely granulated 

 dermis, which also forms a web between the minute spinules 

 forming a feeble fan, on the interactinal plates. No dorsal spin- 

 ules. Papular pores form six or more rows on the rays. In- 

 ternal dorso-ventral columns are present near the margins. Form 

 depressed, pentagonal, with thin margins. A few small ossicles 

 occur between the dorsal plates; usually solitary. No pedicel- 

 lariae have been observed. 



Besides the typical species, this genus seems to include 8. in- 

 fiatus Hutton, of New Zealand. 



