270 A, EF. Verrill—The Bermuda Islands; Coral Reefs. 
Its most remarkable feature is the presence of large, handsome, 
arborescently much branched gills (aetinobranchie) or ‘“pseudo- 
tentacles” outside the true tentacles and usually much exceeding 
them in length. There are normally six of these, but frequently 
only four or five are present. In some cases this is probably due to 
injury, but some specimens appear to be normally pentamerons. 
Duerden records specimens with eight.* These branched organs 
usually bear numerous conspicuous, semi-globular bodies (acrorhagi) 
commonly pale blue in color, but sometimes there are but few of 
them. The tentacles are very numerous, long, rather slender, 
tapered, often flexuous. 
Figure 119.—Lebrunia Dane ; gill, contracted in formalin, natural size. From 
drawing by A. H. V. 
Some of the larger specimens were 8 to 10 inches across in full 
expansion ; the column may be 1 to 2 inches or more in diameter 
and 2 to 6 inches in length, according to the state of expansion. 
The color is somewhat variable. Perhaps most frequently, the 
column is light brownish or fawn-color, but it is often dull greenish 
or olive. The tentacles and gills are similar in color to the body, 
but usually lighter yellowish brown or greenish brown, often fiecked 
* This may indicate an octamerous arrangement of mesenteries and tentacles 
in the adult, especially since Duerden has shown that the very young larve of 
Lebrunia are truly tetramerous or octamerous for a brief period. Some may 
retain that condition through life, as in some other Actinians (see Duerden, 
The Edwardsia stage of the Actinian, Lebrunia, ete., Journ. Linn. Soc. London, 
Zodlogy, xxvii, pp. 269-316, pl. 18, 19, 1899, where the early stages are fully 
discussed). 
