PENNATULIDA. 



identical with K. stelliferum 1 ); of the second it is only said that it is long, slender, and smooth, 

 with a number of large polyps >; neither this description nor the figure, which is very meagre in 

 details, exclude the possibility that it may be the same species. The figure gives the natural size 

 and shows by this and by the proportion as to length between the peduncle and the rhachis (they 

 are of about equal length) that the question is only of a young form. It is my conviction that hardly 

 more than the one species of K. stclliferum (Mull.) is known from the Atlantic Ocean. But on the 

 other hand, it is known in a more complete series of stages than most other Pennatulids; for my 

 own part I have had the opportunity of examining and comparing an almost continuous series 

 from 7.5' nm with one polyp up to 75o mm with more than 150 polyps; such a size as the last is 

 scarcely to be met with in previous literature; neither the first author of the species, O. F. Muller, 

 nor Asbjornsen, who established the genus Kophobelemnon, nor Kolliker, had any idea of how far 

 their specimens in spite of the full development of the sexual products - - were from having 

 reached the maximum development. The very circumstance that specimens of 130 135""" become 

 the types of the species K. stelliferum might be the reason why other stages, and especially the much 

 larger ones, were interpreted as belonging to other species; the most unwarrantable to my mind was 

 the K. mocbii established by Koren and Danielssen, because these authors had so many different 

 specimens, that its relationship to the species of Asbjornsen should have been sufficiently plain. 

 Asbjornsen knew already quite small specimens; he has (1. c. p. 82, PI. X, figs. 3 and 4) described and 

 figured a specimen with only one polyp and another with two polyps, both about 20 3o mm long; 

 later, Grieg (Bergens Mus. Aarb. 1893, Nr. 2, ibid., 1896, no. 3) has described quite a series of develop- 

 mental stages from a length of 6 mm upwards ; young stages are mentioned also in several other authors 

 and sometimes figured (for instance F. E. Schul tze, 1. c. p. 142, PI. II, fig. 2, a specimen 48 mm long 

 with six polyps; M. Marshall ;<Triton-Penn. p. 138, Marshall and Fowler Porcupine-Penn. 

 p. 460). The very young colonies show already that no certain proportion exists between the number 

 of the polyps and the length of the whole colony, as will appear from the following table: 



Already at a length of 8o mm we have specimens with 16 polyps, and at a length of 88 90""" 

 even 18 20 polyps. In the specimens with only one polyp, the primary polyp, this is never placed 

 terminally, but a zooid is found near the apex of the rhachis. In the least developed specimens the 

 whole colony consists of these two individuals only, but by and by the number of zooids is increased 

 along the dorsal side of the stem below the terminal zooid. This zooid, however, is not so markedly 

 different from the other zooids as it is, for example, in Pennatula or Renilla (comp. also Grieg. 1893). 



The < Ingolf has only obtained young stages from four different stations: south of Iceland 

 (St. 40), in Denmark Straits (St. 10), and in Davis Straits (Sts. 24 and 28); altogether 22 specimens. Of 



') In a remark in Rep. Comm. Fish. etc. p. 510, several specimens are said to have been taken later, but further informa- 

 tion of these is wanting. I may add that a specimen from the Skager Rak of quite the same length and also with 8 polyps, 

 agrees remarkably well with the type-specimen of Verrill. 



