352 HISTORY OF BRITISH ZOOPHYTES. 



Specimens are occasionally met with that are in some de- 

 gree roughened with strap -like processes, scattered over 

 the surface, sometimes in clusters of two or three together, 

 about a quarter of an inch in height, of the same horny 

 substance as the cells. They are closed at the top, and it 

 has been conjectured that they are ovaries. The polypes 

 have numerous tentacula, which expand in the form of a 

 bell. " When the polypes are all protruded they form a 

 beautiful object under the microscope, from their numbers, 

 their delicacy, the regularity of their disposition, and the 

 vivacity of their motions, now expanding their tentacula 

 into a beautiful campanulate figure, now contracting the 

 circle, and ever and anon retreating within the shelter of 

 their cells." (Dr. Johnston.} I have elsewhere stated that 

 I have seen a specimen of F. membranacea (and Dr. John- 

 ston has seen its equal) five feet in length by eight inches 

 in breadth. As every little cell had been inhabited by a 

 living polype, by counting the cells on a square inch, I cal- 

 culated that this web of silvery lace had been the work and 

 the habitation of above two millions of industrious, and, we 

 doubt not, happy inmates; so that a single colony, on a 

 submarine island of a foot in length, was almost equal in 

 number to the population of Scotland. Specimens of this 



