CHAPTER VI. 



CORALLINES. 



" As for your pretty Htlle seed-cups or vases, they are a sweet confirmation of the pleasure 

 Nature seems to take in superadding elegance of form to most of her works. How poor 

 and bungling are all the imitations of art! When 1 have the pleasure of seeing you next, 

 we shall sit down nay, kneel down and admire these things." HOGARTH xo ELLIS. 



THE Alcyonaria are so designated from their principal type, that of 

 the Alcyons. The fresh-water species are composed of a fleshy, 

 sponge-like mass, consisting of vertical, aggregated, memhranaceous 

 tubes, which are open on the surface. In these tubes the polyps, 

 which are Isidians, are located. The mouth is encircled with a single 

 series of filiform tentacula, which, like those of the whole family, are 

 depressed or incomplete on one side. The eggs are contained in the 

 tubes, and are coriaceous and smooth. The tentacula of these polyps 

 are generally eight, disposed somewhat like the barbs of a feather, 

 and toothed on their edges like a saw, which has procured them the 

 name of Ctenoceros, from the Greek word %ret9, a comb. Their bodies 

 present eight perigastric lamellse ; their coral is often formed of 

 spiculse. We shall see, farther on, that among the Gorgonidae the 

 coral ceases to be parenchymous that is, spongy and cellular ; that 

 its axis assumes a horny and resistant consistence, which becomes 

 stony in the corallines. In this last group, the external bed, which 

 is the special lodging of the polyps, always remains soft on the surface. 

 We shall have a general idea of the organization, manners, and mode 

 of multiplication among the Alcyonaria when we come to treat of 

 corals and their strange history. The class Alcyonaria is divided 

 into many orders. We shall consider I. The Tubiporinse. II. The 

 Gorgoniadte. III. The Pennatulidve. IV. The Alcyonaria, properly 

 so called. 



