Mascelliineous. 77 
Note on a Variety (?) of Aleyonella fungosa. 
To the Editors of the Annals and Magazine of Natural History. 
GENTLEMEN,—I have much pleasure in introducing to your notice 
a variety, as I believe it to be, of the above species; it grows in 
large pyriform or fusiform masses, on twigs of bushes dipping just 
below the surface of the water, in a pond about a mile from Exeter, 
near the South-western Railway. 
The polyzoon has from forty-eight to fifty tentacles, which are much 
longer than those figured by Professor Allman. The ccencecium is 
repeatedly branched from the base upwards : the upper branches only 
are free; the lower portion is of a very tough, dark-brown, nearly 
black, coriaceous substance, the upper or free portion thin and trans- 
parent; and, instead of being smooth, these are wrinkled into a number 
of transverse folds, the edges of which are frequently coloured brown. 
Some of the apices of the ectocyst are nearly smooth, or with only 
the rudiments of folds; and others, again, are rugged, and the 
orifices widened and rolled back, so as to give them a sort of trumpet- 
shaped mouth; but they all have the brown annulations as above 
mentioned. 
The apices of the ectocyst are emarginate or notched similarly to 
those of A. Benedent, but they have no appearance whatever of a 
ridge or furrow. 
The statoblasts are of three kinds :—1. Those with a rather broad 
annulus, and the centre perforated with a rather large perforation, 
the sides or edges of which are pressed into slight plaits or folds ; 
these vary in colour from pale yellowish brown to a full rich brown ; 
they are dotted with raised points, the same as in the type figured 
by Professor Allman; the annulus is reticulated the same. 2. With 
a much broader outline, nearly orbicular, dark brown, and without 
any perforation. 3. Forming a very broad ellipse, and with a com- 
paratively very broad annulus; this forms somewhat of an angle, 
or point, at the long axis of the ellipse, nearly approaching the form 
of the statoblast in Lophopus crystallinus ; but they are thicker and 
more opaque than in that species. 
The above appear to be the principal differences that I have been 
able to observe in this variety or species. There is one more, however, 
which may have some weight; and that is the form of the tubes: 
these are not round as in A, Benedeni, or pentangular as in A. fun~ 
gosa, but are intermediate between the two; for when a section is 
made of a mass of tubes at right angles to their length, they will be 
seen to be irregular, the outside ones round, whilst those on the in- 
side are from 3- to 4-, 5-, or 6-angular. 
This variety appears to me to be intermediate between A. fungosa 
proper and A. Benedeni, as it seems to possess characters belonging 
to both. Thus the round tubes and the emarginate mouth would 
point to Benedeni; whilst the subangular tubes and the mode of 
growth and attachment, with the form of the staloblasts, point to 
fungosa, leaving the remarkable rugose and annulose appearance of 
the ccencecium peculiar to this variety. 
