Zoological Society. 299 



tained by Mr. George Bennett ; which is smaller than the original 

 specimen, measuring only 1 inch 8 lines in total length to the end 

 of the outstretched tentacle. The body is remarkable for its great 

 flacciditj% which is owing to the very small space occupied by the 

 viscera : these are situated at its anterior part, and not, as in Loli- 

 gopsis, at the bottom of the sac. Besides this disproportion between 

 the bulk of the viscera and the capacity of the containing sac, Cran- 

 chia has other relations with Loligopsis in the absence of the infun- 

 dibular valve, which exists in all the other Decapodous Cephalopods ; 

 and in the non-articulation of the base of the siphon by a double 

 ball and socket joint to the internal surface of the ventro-lateral 

 parts of the mantle. In the Decapodous Cephalopods generally the 

 funnel is articulated to the mantle, at the anterior part of its base, 

 by two ball and socket joints, the projection being on the mantle 

 and the socket on the funnel ; both consisting of cartilage, covered 

 with a fine synovial membrane. The projecting cartilage is of an 

 oval form in the Cuttle-fish : but in Loligo it forms an elongated 

 ridge ; which in Onychoteuthis commences at the anterior margin of 

 the mantle and extends one third down the sac, forming two thin 

 lateral cartilaginous lamina placed rather towards the ventral aspect 

 of the mantle : an elongated groove in the opposite sides of the fun- 

 nel plays upon each of these ridges. In Loligopsis the sides of the 

 funnel adhere to the corresponding cartilaginous lamince, which differ 

 from the lateral cartilages of other Decapodous Cephalopods only by 

 their greater length and tuberculated form. In Cranchia, as in the 

 Octopoda, these cartilages are entirely wanting ; but the ventral 

 parietes of the base of the siphon become expanded, thin, and trans- 

 parent ; and adhere to and become continuous with the correspond- 

 ing parts of the mantle. 



Mr. Owen regards as new the species of Loligo referred to, and 

 describes it under the name of Lol. laticeps : four specimens of it, the 

 largest of which measures only 1^ inch from the extremity of the 

 mantle to the end of the outstretched tentacle, were obtained by 

 Mr. George Bennett among the Sargasso weed, in lat. 29° N., long. 

 47° W. When alive they were of a fine purple colour with dark 

 red spots. The specimens are now destitute of colour on the fins 

 and on the under surface of the third and fourth pairs of arms, and 

 the spots are but few on the under part of the head and mantle ; 

 on the inner surface of the first, second, and third pairs of arms the 

 dark pigment is disposed in broad, irregularly shaped, transverse 

 bands, passing across between each of the pairs of suckers. 



The head, as is indicated by the trivial name, is comparatively 

 broad ; and the arms which it supports are relatively longer than in 

 the Loligines generally, the second and third pairs being nearly 

 equal in length to the trunk. The body is subcylindrical and coni- 

 cal, gradually diminishing in circumference till it terminates in a 

 point at the posterior margin of the fins, which do not extend con- 

 joined together beyond tliis part. The fins are terminal and dorsal, 

 a space of about half a line intervening between their origins ante- 

 riorly, whence their bases converge and are united at the apex of 

 2 M 2 



