230 THE NATURALIST IN AUSTRALIA. 



known as Cup Corals, grow attached to the large Mother-of-Pearl shells in deep 

 water, and, obtained in their naturally united state from the divers, are in considerable 

 favour as card-baskets or other table ornaments. In addition to these cup-shaped 

 varieties there are various other growth-modifications of the genus Turbinaria which 

 may take the form of flattened discs, encrusting or mound-like masses, or of an 

 innumerable host of leaf-like or diversely convoluted lamime. 



By a fortunate coincidence, Mr. H. M. Bernard, M.A., who is continuing the 

 cataloguing of the Madreporaria in the British Museum Collections commenced by the 

 late Mr. George Brook, had selected the genus Turbinaria for his first attention, and 

 was consequently prepared to deal with the extensive series of Australian forms 

 collected and presented to the National Collection by the writer, almost immediately 

 on their arrival. How substantial an accession this series proved may be gathered 

 from the following facts. The catalogue of the genus, now published, indicates that 

 fifty-seven species of Turbinaria are contained in the British Museum Collection. Of 

 these, twenty-eight specific forms were collected and contributed by the writer from 

 the Australian coasts, and out of them no less than twenty were determined by 

 Mr. Bernard to be new to science. Of some species, e.g., Turbinaria, peltata, and 

 T. conspicua, over twenty individual coralla were included in order to illustrate the 

 growth phases and remarkable number of modifications of which one specific type was 

 susceptible. The writer's entire Australian collection numbers, in fact, no less than 

 one hundred and twenty-six specimens out of the total of two hundred and sixty 

 examples from all sources representing the genus Turbinaria described in the British 

 Museum Catalogue. 



Apart from the satisfactory score won for the Australian members of this 

 generic group from a numerical standpoint, the author has, with relation to the 

 specimens most recently obtained from Western Australia, enjoyed the gratification of 

 enriching the National Collection with larger examples of Madreporaria or Stony Corals 

 than had been hitherto possessed by either the British or any other zoological museum. 

 The most remarkable of these examples have been correlated by Mr. Bernard with 

 the titles of Turbinaria conspicua and T. peltata, and were obtained in both instances 

 from Shark's Bay. The photographs taken by the writer of two magnificent specimens 

 of these two corals, and showing them as now occupying positions of honour in 

 the British Museum Coral Galleries, are reproduced on pages 232 and 233. In 

 the matter of greatest mass and weight the palm must undoubtedly be awarded 

 to the example of Turbinaria peltata, in which the hemispherical aggregation of 



