PORITES FROM NO RECORDED LOCALITY. 119 



acquire their typical calicles, apparently only with their typical growth-forms. Hence the 

 relationship of young colonies can only be decided either by direct ob.servation or by the 

 discovery of a series of stages. 



a. Large specimen with very young colony. Zool. Dept. 99. 3. 2. 8. 



113. Porites x. H. (Porites incertce sedis undedvia.) (PI. VII. fig. 3.) 



[British Museum.] 



Description. — The corallum is explanate, encrusting and varying in thickness from 2 to 

 6 mm. with curled up edges. Fresh layers creep over previous growths not always in close 

 contact. The complete form is imknown. 



The calicles with undefined outlines, distinguishable only by the central fossa which may 

 open flush with the surface or at the bottom of a faint depression. The walls are broad and 

 flat, and covered with an even layer of star-like or very jagged granules, which are fairly 

 uniform in size and distance apart. They appear to be the ecliinulate tips and edges of 

 otherwise smooth erect flakes. The septa are not visible under these granules, nor are they 

 indicated round the mouth of the fossa by any pronounced radial arrangements of the latter, 

 although what are apparently interseptal loculi radiate outwards irregularly from the fossa and 

 bend away among the open spaces between the granules. Close round the fossa the granules 

 are sometimes slightly larger than elsewhere, but they seldom form any traceable ring of pali. 

 When, however, this occurs, the usual palic formula can be made out, though incomplete. 

 A distinct columellar tubercle is also sometimes present, at others the fossa is a deep round 

 hole. The texture revealed in vertical section is very open, being built up of thin, regular, 

 vertical trabeculse rather far apart, with thin, regular, horizontal junctions. Tlie rich, warm, 

 buff colovir extends about 1 mm. below the surface. 



This coral is represented only by a fragment. From the specimens with which I found it 

 associated in the collection, I judge it to have been a Pacific Island form, and one of 

 Mr. Gardiner's collection (? from Funafuti). As a mere fragment without definite locality, it 

 would have been hardly worth keeping, but its characters are so far unique. There is nothing 

 I can recall like its rich development of beautiful surface granules obscuring the calicular 

 skeleton. 



a. Zool. Dept. 1906. 1. 1. 15. 



114. Porites x. 12. {Porites incertce sedis duodedma.) (PI. VII. fig. 4.) 



[British Museum.] 



Description. — The corallum is a small, smooth, irregular, cap-shaped growth, encrusting 

 previous layers ; the creeping edges bending under, enveloping, and binding together a mass 

 of sand and small shells. 



