TRAVISIA. 219 



The worm is of a uniform pearl-colour. The motion is said to be 

 very sluggish. 



(a) Scotland, Lieut. Thomas, R.N. 



32. TRAVISIA*. 



Travisia, Johnston in Ann. Nat. Hist. iv. 3/3 (1840)* Grube, Fam. 

 Annel. 71. 



Char. Body soft, vermiform, nearly alike on both dorsal and ven- 

 tral surfaces, divided into an anterior and posterior portion : first 

 segment produced into a small snout, and, as well as the second, 

 apodous : mouth ventral, transverse : the following segments three - 

 ringed, with two rows of fasciculated bristles along each side, and a 

 simple cirriform branchial filament : posterior portion narrow, cylin- 

 drical, with two papillae on each side of the segments, and a short 

 cirriform filament between, with a single fascicle of bristles : penul- 

 timate segment apodous ; the anal with a circle of small papillae. 



In 1840 I characterized this genus from specimens which were 

 found in a collection of Scottish worms presented to me by Pro- 

 fessors Goodsir and Edward Forbes. The specimens were not well 

 preserved by the spirits, and most of them were entirely decom- 

 posed. I am now, therefore, inclined to believe that some of the 

 external appendages may have fallen away ; and that thus errors 

 may have been committed in assigning the characters to the genus. 

 These doubts as to my own accuracy have been raised by an exami- 

 nation of Sars's figures of his Oligobranchus roseus. That the worms 

 are nearly related is very evident ; but that they are synonymous 

 cannot be concluded. 



Sars's definition of his genus Oligobranchus \^ as follows: — " Cor- 

 pus teres arenicoliforme cauda attenuata, segmentorum quodque ex 

 annulis quatuor compositum. Caput distinctum, antice truncatum, 

 tentaculis duobus brevibus ; os subtus proboscide brevissima inerme ; 

 anus terminalis cirris quatuor. Pinnae in segmento quoque utrinque 

 duae discretae ex mammillis cum fasciculis setarum capillarium con- 

 stantes, in segmentis anticis 14-15 absque appendicibus, in reliquis 

 vero et cirro superiori et inferiori conico seu fusiformi ornatae. 

 Branchiarum arbusculaeformium ramosissimarum paria quatuor in 

 segmentis anticis corporis supra et pone pinnas in dorso," — Fauna 

 Litt. Norvegice, i. 91. See also Ann. ^ Mag. Nat. Hist. xx. 348. 



* Travisia, in commemoration of Mr. Travis, an eminent surgeon in Scarborough, 

 and one of those " learned and ingenious friends " to whose correspondence Mr. 

 Pennant was much indebted in preparing his * British Zoology,' Is it Ophelia of 

 Savigny? See Oersted's Groenl. Annul. Dorsibr. 51. Kroyer's Naturh. Tids. 

 1842, 125. 



