POLYNESIAN PORITES. 57 
34. Porites Fiji Islands 19, (P. Fidjiensis nonadecima.) PI. IV. figs. 2, 3, 4; 
Je DQUUE, ite, IAI.) 
[Rotumah, reef near Solkopi, coll. J. S. Gardiner; British Museum.] 
Syn. Porites viridis Gardiner, Proc. Zool. Soc. (1898) p. 268, pl. xxiv. figs. 1, 6, 2.* 
Porites viridis var. apalata (partim) Gardiner, ibid. fig. 1, c. 
Under this heading I have grouped five specimens whose affinities have already been 
pointed out by Mr. Gardiner. They differ from one another in most striking ways, yet close 
analysis shows them all to be variations of one special type of modification. 
General description.—The corallum may either be encrusting, with thin edges, but with 
the surface raised into solid rounded ridges, separated by deep, sharp, irregular valleys, or as 
solid hemispherical mounds with a marked tendency for the upper surface to be broken up 
into rounded hummocks, separated by narrow fissures or infoldings. 
The calicles are conspicuous and funnel-shaped, with sharp wall-ridges which make them 
polygonal; when the ridges are absent the calicles are round, mostly just under 2 mm. in 
diameter. The walls area stout flaky reticulum which varies greatly in texture, and upon these 
variations depend the extraordinary differences of habit seen in the specimens, no two being alike. 
The wall-ridge is only slightly developed upon the convex surfaces, but in the valleys it forms 
the whole wall. Below the ridge the septa begin at once to appear as flakes sloping downwards 
into the fossa; deeper down they lengthen, and, according to their thickness and the depth of 
the calicle, form various more or less incomplete septal patterns. 
The polyps in life are a very bright dark green. 
Specimens a (Pl. IV. fig. 2) and 6 (the types of Mr. Gardiner’s variety “ apalata ”). 
The corallum is massive and hemispherical, showing continuous growth with formation of 
pendent edges; the upper surface is so crowded with rounded and gyrating hummocks as to 
appear convoluted. The walls of the calicles are characterised by the sharp median ridge, 
with its sloping septal flakes very pronounced, and with clean cut jagged edges. The longer 
lower flakes seldom get nearer to producing the typical septal formula than by occasionally 
touching and fusing with adjacent flakes. A coarse flaky reticulum with large meshes fills 
the base of the irregular fossa. Except in the shallow calicles on the pendent edges there are 
no pali, and the radial symmetry is generally obscured. The section (of a) shows a coarse 
reticulum in which all the elements are uniformly very stout, the horizontal elements being 
somewhat more conspicuous than the trabecular. Tabulz are very numerous. 
In 6, which is a large fragment, the calicles are slightly deeper than in a, There are a few 
double calicles, or at least calicles with supernumerary septa ; one of these abnormal calicles was 
* On this figure see remark on specimen b. 
