SABELL.E. 295 



of a secretion from the animal's body, in which the 

 impalpable muddy sediment which the waves agitate, 

 consisting of decomposed organic matter for the most 

 part, is interwoven. The tissue so made is sufficiently 

 tough and enduring, retaining its form long after the 

 animal has died out of it. 



In our dredge-hauls we find a pretty little kind 1 

 common enough, which lives in association, the tubes 

 apparently from half- an- inch to an inch in length, 

 forming dense masses on stones and shells, and project- 

 ing in every direction. A dozen or more may be in one 

 group, and when all are alive, one or another protruding 

 or retiring every moment, it makes a pretty object. 



The gill-filaments are nine to eleven in each row, of 

 a yellowish white, occasionally patched with dead- 

 white, or red -brown : delicately and densely pinnate. 

 The filaments, in the act of protruding, are closed 

 together like a straight bundle of rods which suddenly 

 fall open at the ends. In this moment of unfolding, 

 their tip's are seen to be a little hooked inwards. The 

 tube is about as large as a crow-quill; under a lens it 

 appears speckled, as if the inorganic matter imbedded 



1 I have figured a group in the centre of Plate xxxm. I cannot satis- 

 factorily identify it with any species described in Grube's Fam. der Anne- 

 lideti. It has some affinities with the Sabella penicillus of Miiller; and 

 still more with S. gracilis of Grube. This latter is defined, however, as 

 wanting the two naked threads by the mouth, which in my little species 

 are sufficiently conspicuous. I must leave it undetermined. 



