OCEAN LIFE. 



ANTHOZOA ASTEROIDA. 



G-orgonida. THE generic characters of Gorgonia are thus 

 described by Johnson. "Polype, mass rooted, arborescent, con- 

 sisting of central axis, barked with a polypiferous crust ; the 

 axis, horny, continuous, and flexible, branched in co-equality 

 with the polype mass ; the crust when recent, soft and fleshy, 

 when dried, porous and friable ; the orifices of the polype cells, 

 more or less protuberant." 



In the Hydroid Zoophytes, it was observed that the horny 

 skeleton formed, as it were, a case, or external support for the 

 fleshy part of the animal and its polypes, which in the asteroid 

 groups, included in the families of Pennatulidae and Gorgonidse, 

 the 'skeleton consists of a central horny or calcareous axis, 

 around which arc arranged the polype, bearing fleshy parts. 

 " These horn plants grow with the stem and branches upwards ; 

 the latter are usually situated in a plane and often coalesce. 

 Many earlier and later writers, have believed the stem to be a 

 plant, on which polypes had fixed themselves. In the Gorgonia, 

 a beautiful frame-work of horny matter, consisting of a stem, 

 and a minute net work of branches, occupies the centre of the 

 structure ; and this is clothed with a soft flesh, through which 

 the channels pass that connect the polypes together. This 

 plant is covered with a firm skin, in which a great amount of 

 earthy crystals is deposited, so as to form a crust, and in this, 

 are the hollows or cells by which the polypes are protected. In 

 the dead structures with which we are familiar, under the name 

 of sea fans (Gorgonia flabellum) the dark horny flexible stem, is 

 seen to be covered in many parts with a brittle crust, often brightly 

 colored, which can be scaled off and crumbled to powder. Be- 

 tween the two, in the living state, the fleshy coat existed ; the 

 inner part of it, being in contact with the exterior of the horny 

 stem, which was then soft, and scarcely distinct from it, while 

 the exterior part was consolidated by the earthy matter into the 

 firm integument. The animals (in Gorgonia) may be scattered 

 irregularly over the whole surface, or they may range in series 

 or bands, on opposite sides only, of the stems and branches. The 



