12 W. J. CAIRD. 



cess in procuring live specimens by the fact that the pressure at the 

 surface is vastly different from what they have been accustomed to, and 

 the sudden change is too great for the poor little dears. But I have seen 

 drawings of them, so I am still hopeful that perseverance may yet win 

 the day. 



It is scarcely possible to imagine that our imaginary collection can 

 be without a specimen of the 13ottle-brush if our collector has been 

 receiving all the useless stuff from a fisherman's line. How very appro- 

 priate is the name it has Bottle-brush ! Instantly our mind flies to the 

 idea of the twisted wire and the bristles all at one end, and such is a very 

 good resemblance to our next Thiuaria Thuia as it is called. It is of 

 a dull brown colour, and by no means prepossessing. It attaches its 

 stolon to a shell commonly a mussel, but a stone is also equally service- 

 able. I have never seen it attached to a weed, but minute algae fre- 

 quently incrust it when it is dead' It reaches a length commonly of 

 about 6 or 7 inches, though specimens of a foot long may sometimes be 

 got. In almost every case the branches are about two-thirds up the 

 stalk, so that the top third is the only part which carries the polypes. 

 On some of the specimens on the table if you examine the stalk with a 

 pocket lens you will find the scars where the older branches dropped off. 

 Is not this another point for the botanist ? Does he not find leaf scars 

 and branch scars where there have been droppings off? Aye, but he 

 has to account for the peculiar shape of the branches here. No leaves 

 only branches, and these fitted half through with cells. He cannot get 

 off by saying these cells correspond to the stomata of plants, for what is 

 the use of stomata to a plant sixty fathoms down beneath the flowing 

 tide ? If he thinks so he must find out the guard cells, he must account 

 for the polypes in the cells, and what I think will be more difficult, he 

 must explain away the difficulty of the polypes being joined to the 

 central body mass. 



The gonothecae or seed capsules arise on the top side of the branch. 

 If you examine one of the specimens with a pocket lens you will find the 

 gonothecae as minute translucent balls. They are several times the size 

 of a single cell, and as is customary each has a lid or operculum to permit 

 of the exit of the young medusoids. 



This leads us to the dwarf trees. For our illustration I have chosen 

 Eudendrium rameum a very common form. As you see, it resembles 

 a tree very much, which I suppose partly or wholly accounts for the 

 Greek derivation of its name. It never grows very high in this district, 



