76 Natural History Bulletin. 



long before the evening of each day spent on the pentacrinus 

 grounds. We had the great satisfaction, however, of feeling 

 that we were attaining a marked success, and stuck to the work 

 every day, and all day, until our ambition was satisfied in the 

 matter of crinoids. Besides the pentacrini. a number of species 

 of Comatula?. including several Act/'iioiiicira. served to enlarge 

 our series of crinoids. 



At this station we reaped a rich harvest of marine inverte- 

 brates of almost every class, and found the ground well worth 

 working over, even had there been no •• sea-lilies " secured. 

 Among the Crustacea there were fewer individuals than we 

 encountered elsewhere, and yet those secured were almost 

 in\'ariabh- of peculiar interest. The macrourans were rep- 

 resented by two striking forms, one a species of Miinida. having 

 greatlv elongated chelipeds and long antenna? widely separated 

 at the base. The eyes are greatly enlarged and deeplv pig- 

 mented, indicatino- a constant functional use of these or<jans, 

 which could doubtless discern both pre\" and enemies as the 

 animal wandered around the patches of phosphorescent gor- 

 gonians so abundant in this localit\". What a weird and ghostlv 

 world it must be down there! A world of fitful phosphor- 

 escent gleams amid the eternal night and unbroken silence, a 

 land tenanted by grotesque shapes wandering among the 

 miniature palm-groves of pentacrini, each living but to kill and 

 eat, and in turn to be killed and eaten. The struggle for 

 existence must be as sharp down there as elsewhere in nature, 

 but it seems to our notion more grim, with less of jo}' because 

 with less of light and sound, and less of pleasure because with 

 less to impress the senses. 



Another still more interesting macrouran was a little fellow 

 with his tail flexed tightlv beneath the thorax, and enormoush' 

 lengthened chelipeds and chela-, these organs being no less 

 than four times the entire apparent length of the body. ^Fhe 

 chela? are, moreover, distinguished by ha\'ing one large tooth 

 on the inferior cutting edge of the forceps, and anterittr to 

 this a number of minute nodules. Thev are pro\'ided. more- 

 o\'er. with conspicuous tufts of hair w hich project like a cam- 



