MALAYAN PORITES. 181 
the ultimate filaments and granules of the surface are frequently hollowed into fine tubes, 
apparently by the well-known coral-boring alga. 
Esper’s coral, called by Dana Porites conferta, with which Mr. Bassett-Smith identified it, 
is a Goniopora. 
a. Zool. Dept 89. 9. 24. 76. 
182. Porites China Sea (1919. (P. Sinensis nonadecima.) 
(Pl. XXVII. fig. 9.) 
[Tizard Bank, Sand Kay, 3 feet, coll. Bassett-Smith ; British Museum. | 
Syn. “ Porites mucronata Dana” Bassett-Smith, Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist. 6°, vi. (1890) p. 456. 
Description.—The corallum rises from a narrow stalk into a broad, smooth, flabellate 
expansion, the upper edge of which divides irregularly into stout branches ; these may again 
expand and again divide. The ultimate branchlets are round, sometimes slightly constricted, 
and pointed, and from 4-6 cm. long; the tips may divide into small diverging points. The 
living layer is 12-13 cm. deep, its lower edge showing a tendency to creep downwards. 
The calicles, except on the terminals, are very ill-defined, as mere breaks in the smooth 
surface about 1 mm. in diameter. The walls are everywhere flat, and consist of broad flakes 
(except on the terminals where the flakes rise into a low, irregular, median ridge). The flakes 
are much broken up and have elegantly frosted edges, and their surfaces are covered with 
granules, which are expanding irregularly into a new layer. The septa are tongues of these 
flakes, of different widths and at different levels ; the radial symmetry being frequently quite 
obscured. The pali are mere granules on the tips of the septal tongues, often almost 
constricted off from them. There may be as many as eight. Flakes stretch right across 
the fossa a short way down, and from them a small columellar tubercle rises. 
The section shows very stout, irregular, concentric layers, with only very slight and 
irregular traces of radial trabecule. 
The colour of the unbleached coral is a rich reddish-brown. 
This is another of the numerous branching Porites which show a great development 
of the horizontal elements, and the comparative suppression of the trabeculz (see Table II1.). 
The growth-form is striking. On the coral called Porites mucronata, by Dana, which was 
also built on the same principle, see p. 163. 
a. Zool. Dept. 89. 9. 24. 74. 
