320 ZOOPHYTES. 



subseriatis. Cor alia super fide stellata et plana, non plicata; oririmis 

 conspicuis, sed cellis nullis ; lamettis subintegris, alternis plus minusve 

 minoribus. 



Attached Fungidae, budding; explanate, glomerate or subramose; 

 polyps obsolescently teritaculate, scattered, rarely transversely sub- 

 seriate. Coralla having the surface plane and stellate, and not 

 plicate ; oririmes distinct, but cells none ; lamellae nearly or quite 

 entire, the alternate somewhat smaller. 



The Pavonise usually grow in aggregated crest-like folia. Some 

 species consist of leaves, hardly a line thick, gracefully clustered into 

 hemispherical clumps ; and others of larger and thicker plates, aggre- 

 gated so as to intersect and leave angular or polygonal spaces between. 

 The folia usually coalesce by their margins wherever they come in 

 contact. 



The animals are like those of the Fungise in general character ; 

 they are quite small, each seldom exceeding three lines in breadth! 

 When alive and expanded the tentacles appear as mere inflations of 

 the exterior membrane around each polyp-mouth, and are extremely 

 short. In the species examined, the general colour of the zoophyte 

 was some shade of umber or brown, while the mouth and tentacles 

 were the prevailing bright green. The surface of the corallum is 

 covered with neat stars, consisting of minute, nearly entire lamellae, 

 which pass uninterruptedly from one centre to another, and are often 

 nearly parallel in the intervals. These lamellae are generally alter- 

 nately smaller, though sometimes very nearly equal; when the latter 

 they appear much more crowded and numerous. The number in a 

 breadth of one-fourth of an inch, over the inner part of a folium, varies 

 in different species (excluding the P. explanulata), from eighteen to 

 twenty-eight, or generally from twenty-four to twenty-eight. Though 

 commonly bifacial, they are sometimes unifacial. 



Besides the foliaceous Pavoniee described, there are also massive 

 species, which should be properly included in this genus. They have 

 been hitherto united with the genus Astraa, yet have all the charac- 

 teristics of a Pavonia in their stars and polyps. A glomerate form is 

 no ground for a generic separation. 



The Pavoniee have affinities with the AstraidaB through the Trida- 

 cophyllise, in some species of which, the foliaceous septa are sparsely 

 covered with oririmes closely resembling those of this genus. They 



