24S Mr. J. W. Pryde on Annelida Polychoeta 



iierve-cord. On this cord there are small ganglia which are 

 situated in the same part of each segment as the feet and 

 troin which branches are sent out to the feet and the gut. 



Family Sphaerodoridae. 

 Genus Ephesia, H. Rathke. 



Ephesia gracilis. 



One incomplete specimen having seventy-eight segments 

 ■was dredged along with Syllis cormita in 15 fatlioms. The 

 example is almost complete, only a few of the posterior seg- 

 ments being absent. It is linear in outline, tapered ante- 

 riorly and posteriorly, and attaining its maximum breadth 

 about the thirty-second segment. 



The head is fairly large, almost quadrangular in shape, 

 and at the anterior corners of the quadrangle there are bulb- 

 bke palpi which have nipple-like apices. The cirri in the 

 anterior region are very indistinct, having been damaged in 

 the mounting of the example. The anterior segments are 

 short, fairly narrow, and appear to be somewhat crowded ; 

 but in the posterior region of the animal the segments are so 

 broad that the intervals between consecutive feet are con- 

 spicuous. The colour is brown and the body-wall is so thin 

 and transparent that the entire gut is seen as a simple tube 

 which is narrow anteriorly, very wide in the mid-region, and 

 fairly wide posteriorly. All over the body, both dorsally 

 and ventrally, occur numerous transverse stria?, wliich are 

 only visible under very high power. The animal is not 

 mature. 



The Spha^rodoridse do not occur in Grube's ' Gazelle ' 

 collection nor in that from the Philippines. Schmarda gives 

 a single doubtful form fiom Jamaica. In the ' Porcupine ' 

 Expedition this species was obtained at a depth of 664 

 fatlioms, and in the Norske Nordhavs-Expedition it occurred 

 at 417 fathoms. No mention of tiie species is made in the 

 * Challenger ' Report, but an interesting form, Ephesia ant- 

 arctica, was procured at Station 156 near the antarctic circle 

 at a depth o[ 1975 fathoms^. 



" The segments resemble those of the common Ephesia 

 gracilis. Dorsally is the large globular appendage, which 

 exiiibits a much more minute papilla than in the latter form, 



* Vide ' Challenger ' IJeport, vol. xii. p. 3G1. 



