OPHIUROIDEA OF THE BAHAMA EXPEDITION. 2 I 



disk is paler brown, more or less speckled with darker brown. 

 The under arm-plates are often bordered by whitish. Those 

 from Tortugas are mostly larger and appear stouter, with 

 more crowded spines on the disk. The colors are mostly 

 greenish blue or cobalt-blue, but some are reddish brown. 

 All are banded on the arms with triple bands of white, with 

 darker on each side, as above. Usually the intervening 

 bands are speckled with white or pale gray. The number of 

 spines on the disk is variable. 



According to Prof. Nutting, those dredged off Little Cat 

 Island, in 3 to 13 fathoms, in life had the disk bluish violet, 

 marked with radial lines of purple and white, and the arms 

 were banded with pairs of pure white lines, enclosing bands of 

 deep cobalt-blue. 



Tortugas, forty examples; Egg Key, eight examples; Ba- 

 hama Banks, eight examples; Bahia Honda, one example; 

 Sta. 68, off Little Cat Island, 3 to 13 fathoms, one example. 

 Common at the Florida Keys and throughout the West Indies 

 and to Cumana in shallow water. 



Ophiothrix suensonii Liltken. 



Ophiothrix suensonii Eiitken, Vid. Meddel., p. 15, 1856; Add. ad Hist. 

 Oph., Pt. II, p. 148, pi. IV, fig-. 2. Eyman, Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., 

 V, 9, p. 232; op. cit., X, p. 267. Verrill, Trans. Conn. Acad., I, p. 342, 

 1868. Eyman, Report Voy. Challenger, Zool., Ophiuroidea, V, p. 222, 

 1882. Nutting-, Narrative Bahama Exp., p. 221 (colors). 



According to Prof. Nutting, in life the colors are very ele- 

 gant. The disk is delicate lavender color, with ten sharp 

 radiating lines of purple, running in pairs from the center to 

 the margin, each pair enclosing a light violet stripe; four con- 

 centric purple lines run around near the upper edge of the 

 disk; the lower side is marked by similar concentric lines of 

 purple and white alternating; along the median dorsal sur- 

 face of the arm there is a purple stripe bordered on each side 

 by a fine white line; on the under side of the arms a similar 

 line runs from the mouth to the tip of the arm. He states 

 that the glassy arm-spines are nine times as long as an arm- 



