88 MADREPORARIA. 
The method of growth of this coral is very regular and typical. The epithecal bands, 
which might be expected round the sides as growth-period follows growth-period, are not 
seen, because the edges bend and creep down the sides. (See remarks and Diagram A, fig. 2, 
p. 24, Introduction, Vol. IV.) The membranous walls, here sharply exsert, are interesting. 
The specimen was labelled “ P. parvistellata Quelch” by Mr. Ridley (see P. New Hebrides 1 
p. 81); but the calicles are much larger than in that type, and the walls are much taller and 
more uniformly membranous, and the method of growth is different. 
a. Zool. Dept. 84. 12. 11. 12. 
66. Porites Solomon Islands (98. (P. Salomonis octava.) (Pl. VIII. fig. 7; 
Pl. XIII. fig. 28.) 
[Choiseul Bay, coll. Dr. Guppy ; British Museum. | 
Description.—The corallum rises into low, irregularly compressed columns or ovals, with 
swollen, rounded tops. The living layer, which is about 4 em. deep, dies progressively, and 
appears to be covered by a thin, epithecal pellicle, which corrodes away. 
The calicles are deep and polygonal at the top, but get shallower and rounder down the 
sides, about 1:5 mm. across. The walls are pronounced, thick and high, and form together a 
very striking network covering the surface. On the growing top they have a thin, ragged, 
trabecular edge; lower down they are crisp and reticular, and the origin of the reticulum 
out of intervening trabecule, though obscured, is traceable. The septa are symmetrical, 
lamellate, very thin and short, so as to leave an open, deep, and conspicuous fossa, in the base 
of which is a delicate, open columellar tangle. The typical fusion of the septa can only 
occasionally be traced, low down, where they join the columellar tangle. Young polyps appear 
in the tops of the walls in the angles. No distinct rings of pali appear in these calicles’ 
on the growing top of the stock. Down the sides, the skeleton everywhere gradually’ 
thickens, the calicles become shallow, and pali gradually appear, ultimately becoming yery 
prominent, with a lamellate columellar tubercle. These pali reach almost to the height of the 
thick walls, from the tops of which twelve thick wedge-shaped septa closely packed descend 
slantingly. The granulation of the walls is very marked, the grains being large and close, 
like the teeth of a file. 
This coral has all the usual characteristics of a Goniopora. The deep angular young 
ealicles with lamellate septa and without pali on the top of the coral, while at its 
sides the walls gradually thicken, and the calicles get shallower and the pali more and 
more prominent, until in the shallowest calicles just before they die down they form the 
well-known rosette of pali, are characters which can be found in any Goniopora or in 
any Porites. The specimen was labelled “Porites Gaimardi M.-E.& H.,” but that 
“species” had shallow calicles with prominent, rough septa and conspicuous round 
pali, according to the original description and figures of Quoy and Gaimard. We have, 
then, in this case a specimen which might belong either to Porites or Goniopora. It 
