32 PENNATULIDA. 



stage, 30""" long, with wings with 3 polyps, a quite short pen with developed polyps, but a long rudi- 

 ment-region; here also two naked axial ends project from the sarcosoma at the top, one quite short 

 broken off, the other rather long (5 6""") and evidently in process of decay, being plainly divided 

 into a series of short, loosely connected pieces, like joints '). 



In a complete specimen, 423 inm long (the peduncle 8o mm ), with wings with six polyps, from the 

 Norwegian coast off Arendal, the wings of the left side are normal, whilst those of the right side, 

 even quite down in the rudiment-region are placed in an inverted position, so that the calyx- 

 openings and the tentacles of the polyps are turned towards the peduncle. It is well-known that 

 the wings have a considerable power of motion, and I have often seen that they may also be turned 

 in such a way as to make the polyps point downwards, but here the question is somewhat different; 

 in the present specimen, the group of lateral zooids belonging to the inverted wings is placed above 

 the wing instead of below it, and by serial sections I have convinced myself that both zooids and 

 polyps here turn the ventral side upward, pointing towards the top of the colon}-, whilst the 

 zooids and polyps of the correctly situated wings of the left side are placed normally with the dorsal 

 side turned upwards. The same abnormality is seen in two fragments of the upper part of the pen 

 in a specimen with four polyps in the wings, from Bohuslan, Flatholmen, and in another fragment 

 from the same locality, with three polyps in the wings, in which latter the abnormal side is disting- 

 uishable as the right one, the end of the stalk being preserved. The last-mentioned specimens belong 

 to the Museum in Stockholm. An abnormality, probably of a somewhat similar kind, is mentioned by 

 Kolliker in a specimen of Haliplcris christii (Mongr. p. 244); I have found no statement elsewhere of 

 such features having been observed before. 



As to the synonymy of V. mirabilis, I have without any hesitation referred the l\ Ljun^- 

 mctnni of Kolliker to this species. He has established his species on a fragment (in the Museum in 

 Stockholm) from the Azores, and he himself expresses (Monogr. p. 197) a strong doubt as to its specific 

 difference from V. mirabilis; after all, I think that its geographical occurrence, so far distant from 

 what is otherwise known for mirabilis, has been the special reason of its being established as a separate 

 species. Later, the correctness of this species has hardly been carefully examined; it has, so far as I 

 know, only been mentioned later by Studer as having been obtained in fragments by l'Hirondelle 

 in the Bay of Gascony, without, however, any further information as to its structure, and by 

 Whiteaves from the Gulf of St. Lawrence (Catal. Mar. Inv. East. Canada, 1901, p. 33). So far as I 

 can discern from the careful description of this species by Kolliker, there is no sufficient reason for 

 retaining it. The same can also be said for the V. multiflora Kner of the Adriatic, which Kolliker 

 himself seems to be most inclined to regard as a local variety. Only the fact that the specimen in 

 our Museum, in spite of its size, is provided with remarkably small polyps, could raise some doubt in 

 ni)- mind ; the polyps, however, are just as small in a large fragment of V. mirabilis from the Vestman 

 Islands (Th. Jonsson); but this specimen has evidently been somewhat dried. No doubt also the 

 Virgularia sp. mentioned by P. Fischer, from the west coast of France (Loire-Inferieure, at Croizic), 



') A double calcareous axis in \'irg. mirabilis has been observed before in a single specimen by Dal3-ell (1. c. p. 187) 

 PI. XLJII, fig. 8. The bones were unequal, a longer and a shorter, the longer extending so regularly, that the shorter might 

 have been almost considered a fragment accidentally or supernaturally introduced along with it amidst the fleshy substance >. 



