316 MEMORANDA. 



The only accommodation provided foi" the Avhole of the 

 above is a series of glass jars and vases placed on shelves in 

 the windows of an ordinary London dwelling-room, the largest 

 glass not exceeding three gallons capacity. It is not pre- 

 tended, however, that those animals, which are notoriously 

 short-lived in confinement (such for instance as Nos. 27 to 32) 

 even under the most advantageous circumstances of space, had 

 their existence more prolonged with me : I would merely state 

 that I have met with no more difficulties with the artificial than 

 with the actual sea-water, under the same conditions. Nos. 1, 

 (this is now in the gravid state represented in Johnston's 

 Zoophytes, Plate 1), 2 and 16, made their appearance, spon- 

 taneously as it were, on some empty shells and other debris 

 placed in the water six months before, and which had not been 

 changed during the whole of that period. Nos, 3, and 5 to 10, 

 are very hardy with me, but No, 4 is in general precarious, 

 Nos. 13, 14, 15 lived in a quart jar for three months, at the 

 end of which time I disposed of them, after they had added 

 hundreds of new cells to the polypidoms, Nos. 19, 20, 21 

 added considerably to their tubes, the new portion being in- 

 dicated in No. 20 by its superior whiteness, and the rate of 

 increase being about a third of an inch in six months. On 

 the 1st of May, I counted ten young of this species, the parents 

 having been in my possession since September 4. Colonies of 

 No, 23 are very vigorous and active, but I find that they have 

 a period of rest from soon after midnight to about 4 or 5 P. M. 



Many of the ActiuicB mentioned in the above list are the 

 same individuals which I had at the commencement of my 

 experiments, and most of them have brought forth young 

 abundantly. The development of Nos. 16 (this especially), 

 17, 18 have afforded me many weeks of most intei'esting ob- 

 servation. ■ In Nos. 39 and 40, I have noticed that frequently 

 the cirrlii have began to play as quickly as ever, even after a 

 period of inaction so long that I have supposed the animals to 

 be dead. 



In the vegetation, I find that No. 42 is the most effective in 

 the evolution of oxygen. No, 41 stands next. No. 44 is apt 

 to decay if not placed in a shaded spot, but it is always inte- 

 resting from the quantity of parasitic animals usually found 

 upon it. 



I trust that these desultory observations, hastily thrown to- 

 gether, but scrupulously containing nothing that I have not 

 personally witnessed in my own collection, will have the effect 

 of increasing the domestication of the interesting productions 

 of our shores. — William Alfrkd Lloyd, 164, St. John Street 

 Road, Islvigton, London, June 6, 1855. 



