ANNOTATED LIST. 189 
Actinopyga miliaris. 
Holothuria miliaris Quoy and Gaimard. 1833. Voy. Astrolabe, 4, p. 137. 
Actinopyga miliaris Bell. 1887. Sci. Trans. Roy. Dublin Soe. (2), 3, p. 653, pl. xl, fig. 1. 
This is the ‘‘black-fish”’ of the béche-de-mer fishermen, and was called by Kent (1893) 
Actinopyga polymorpha. He says it occurs on the reefs near low water-mark and is of high 
commercial value. It seems to be rare at Mer, as we found only a single specimen. That 
one is peculiar in having siz anal teeth; the sixth, however, is smaller than the others 
and is quite near to one of them; there are only 5 longitudinal muscles, and there is no 
other evidence of any tendency to hexamerous symmetry. This specimen was found cling- 
ing to the underside of a rock-fragment on the reef-flat and when collected was almost 
globular, with a diameter of about 100 mm. The color seemed nearly black. When narco- 
tized with magnesium sulphate it relaxed and became more than 200 mm. long and about 60 
mm. wide in the middle. The color was then seen to be deep brown. The range of miliaris 
is from Mozambique and the Red Sea to the Riu Kiu, Caroline, and Tonga Islands. 
Actinopyga nobilis. 
Miilleria nobilis Selenka. 1867. Zeit. f. w. Zool., 17, p. 313, pl. xvii, figs. 13-15. 
Actinopyga nobilis Fisher. 1907. Proc. U.S. Nat. Mus., 32, p. 647. 
This is the ‘“‘teat-fish”’ or ‘‘mammy-fish”’ of the Torres Strait region and ranks second 
only to ‘‘prickly red” in the market. It ranges from Natal to the Red Sea on the African 
coast and thence to the Hawaiian and Fiji Islands. How far south it goes on the Australian 
coast is unknown. Kent (1893) gives a good photograph (pl. xxxrv, fig. 3) of a typical, 
somewhat contracted specimen, but as he overlooked the anal teeth, he called it by the 
appropriate but unnecessary name Holothuria mammifera. At Mer this species was rare, 
and it is probably so around all the inhabited islands, where its commercial value is a 
serious handicap in the struggle for existence. Pearson (1914) proposes to separate this 
species and parvula from Actinopyga in a genus, Argiodia. As I am very much in doubt 
about the status of parvula, I prefer not to use Argiodia at present, but I think with nobilis 
as the type it will ultimately be a useful genus. Unfortunately, Pearson fails to designate 
any type and, still worse, does not include either nobilis Selenka or maculata Brandt in 
the genus as first diagnosed and published. But he does include as his first species (and 
apparently in each of his five subgenera he intends the first species named to be regarded 
as the type) Argiodia maculata (Selenka). As there is no such holothurian, it is obvious 
(and is shown in his next paper) that this is a slip of the pen for Argiodia maculata (Brandt), 
which is the equivalent of Miilleria nobilis Selenka, and I hereby designate this species as 
the type of Argiodia. The name Argiodia would seem to be a pure synonym of Microthele 
Brandt and will therefore have to give way to the latter, which is fortunately very appro- 
priate, at least to nobilis. 
Mitsukuri (1912), under the doubly erroneous name Miilleria maculata, gives with 
important figures a very good account of this species as he has studied it in the Riu Kiu 
Islands. It is 60 years since Bronn first pointed out that the name Miilleria could not be 
used for a holothurian. No one (save Verrill in 1867) paid any attention to his clear state- 
ment and his new name, Actinopyga, until Bell in 1887 took up the name and rightly de- 
manded its use. Fisher (1907) and Pearson (1914) have followed him, but Sluiter (1894 
and 1901), Koehler and Vaney (1908), and Mitsukuri (1912) have persisted in this no longer 
excusable error. As for the specific name maculata, it has already been pointed out by 
other authors (Fisher, 1907, p. 664, for example) that Holothuria maculata Chamisso and 
Eysenhardt, 1821, preémpted that name; hence Brandt’s Holothuria maculata is a homonym 
which is necessarily rejected and under article 36 of the International Code can not 
be revived. 
