368 



SPONGIIDA. 



BY 



STUART 0. RIDLEY. 



The published information relating to the marine Sponges of 

 Australia is very limited, both as compared -with that relating to 

 other groups of the Animal Kingdom, and as compared with the 

 attention which has been paid to them by collectors. Large quan- 

 tities of Sponges have been sent to England from this coast, and the 

 national collection of France possesses a large number evidently of 

 similar origin ; but notwithstanding this fact, the number of in- 

 telligibly described species is surprisingly small. Dr. Bowerbank, 

 who obtained very large supplies of material, chiefly from S.W. 

 Australia, only described* 14 species which may be said to have 

 probably come from this continent ; these are chiefly Silicea. 

 Mr. Carter has described f 8 species from Bass's Straits, and some 

 25 from other localities (almost entirely southern and south- 

 western); of these 33, about one half are Silicea, and most of the 

 remainder are Ceratosa. Prof. HackelJ describes 16 species of 

 Calcarea from the south and east coasts; A. Hyatt § records 8 

 Ceratosa from South and East Australia ; Prof. Selenka || shortly 

 describes and figures 5 Sponges from Melbourne and Bass's Straits ; 

 and "W. Marshall^]", Gray**, and some other writers add a few 

 species to the list; Polejaeffft adds 11 Calcarea to the fauna. 

 Dr. Gray describes a remarkable form, Xenospongia , from Torres 

 Straits, the only Siliceous species which I can find hitherto described 

 as definitely obtained from North Australia. 



The older writers by no means neglected the Sponges of Australia ; 

 and in particular Lamarck XX described 53 species from " Mers 

 Australes," collected by Messrs. Peron and Lesueur, of which, as 

 we shall see below, there is considerable reason to believe that 

 many were obtained off the more northern parts of the continent ; a 

 few are certainly from the south (King Island and Francis and 

 Kangaroo Islands). There is, however, the very serious difficulty 

 connected with these descriptions of Lamarck that they are ex- 



* Chiefly in Proc. Zool. Soc. 1872-76. 



t In Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist, 1873-84. | Die Kalkschwamme. 



§ Mem. Bost. Soc. ii. || Zeitsch. wiss. Zool. xvii. 



% Zeitsch. wiss. Zool. xxxv. 



** Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. (4) vi. ; Proc. Zool. Soc. 1869. 

 ft Zoology H.M.S. 'Challenger,' part xxiv. 



|| Ann. Mns. Hist, Nat. xx. (besides an uncertain number, as Alcyonia, in 

 Mem. Mus. Nat. Hist. i.). 



