Part II. — Stichodactylincc and Zoanthece. 181 



Genus.— CORYNACTIS, Allman. 



Corynactis, . Allman, 1846; Johnson, 1847; Milne-Edwards, 1857; Gosse, 



1860; Andres, 1883; Hertwig, 1888; Haddon, 1898, 

 Draytonia^ . Duchassaing and Michelotti, 1866. 



CorallimorpliidsB, in which the column-wall is smooth, tentacles knobbed, 

 arranged in several cycles and in radiating rows, the outer larger than the inner. 

 Tentacles and mesenteries generally tetramerous. Gouidial grooves present or 

 absent. An ectodermal longitudinal muscular layer on the column-wall and on the 

 stomodseal wall ; endodermal sphincter muscle very weak. Mesenterial filaments 

 devoid of ciliated streak. Mesogloea practically homogeneous. 



All the representatives of the genus are small polyps, and the descriptions 

 of the various species given by the older writers refer only to the external 

 features. The most salient of these are the knobbed tentacles, and the com- 

 munication of more than one with a mesenterial space. In the present species, 

 and in C. viridis, they are tetramerous, but in C. carnea, Stud., according to 

 Kwietniewski's (1898) observations, the mesenteries appear to be hcxamerous. 



Professor Hertwig (1888) was the first to make a histological examination 

 of any member of the genus, and to discover the presence of longitudinal muscle 

 fibres on the outer side of the body-wall. Professor Haddon and myself (1896, 

 p. 152) found the same in C. australis, and Haddon (1898, p. 467) in C. hoplites. 



MM. Duchassaing and Michelotti erected the genus Draytonia for the species 

 about to be described, distinguishing it from Corynactis on account of the circle 

 of green spots upon the capitulum and disc. In the specimens which I have 

 examined, the pigment spots do not pi-oject above the smooth surface, and those 

 on the column cannot be in any way regarded as acrorhagi, and may or may 

 not be present. They are certainly not deserving of generic distinction. 



Haddon (1898, p. 468) refers to the curious fact that an " emerald green ring 

 round the capitulum is characteristic of forms so widely distributed as European 

 Seas ( C. viridis), off the coast of Buenos Ayres ( C. carnea), and Port Phillij?, Australia 

 ( C. australis).'''' In the present instance the ring is represented by a circle of spots 

 of the same colour. 



Corynactis myrcia (Duchassaing and Michelotti). 



(PL X., fig. 10 ; PI. XII., fig. 7; PI. xiii., figs. 3-5 ; PI. xv., fig. 3.) 



Draytonia myrcia, . Duchassaing and Michelotti, 1866, p. 124, pi ii., fig. 8. 

 Corynactis myrcia, . Andres, 1883, p. 485. 



The base is spreading, and in diameter larger than the column. It is irregular 



TKAKS. KOr. BUB. SOC, N.S -VOL. VII., PAET VI. 2 D 



